Here to Protect You: The White Darkness
by bob115
Summary: WARNING Contains Spoilers Do Not Continue Reading Summary If You Haven't Read The Mangas Up To 315 or watched the anime up to 203. This is what happens if Ichigo stays in Hueco Mundo with Nel after the captains arrive. Please read rest of summary inside.
1. Chapter 1

Summary: Please don't stop reading after this or the second chapter, because it does get better after chapter 2. I do plan on coming back and fixing the first two chapters when I have some time. So please don't pass this story off because of the first two chapters!

EDIT: Ok this is the new and (hopefully) improved chapter 1.

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**A/N: Ok, this ff takes place after manga chapter 315 (if I had to guess I'd say that in the anime this would be around episode 197-200ish). By the way the original concept was created by vinrylgrave of deviant art. Also, please take a look at these pics before you read(copy and paste them since links don't work here and replace the [DOT] with a period) vinrylgrave[DOT]deviantart[DOT]com/art/Rise-Tenshagaigyaku-Zangetsu-80048645and vinrylgrave[DOT]deviantart[DOT]com/art/IchixNell-Here-to-Protect-You-79888165 . Just to set the scene, all the captains and the main group (Renji, Rukia, Ishida, Nel, ect.) are all gathered by where Ichigo and Kenpachi are. Also in this chapter Nel is in her child form and I won't be trying to imitate her lisp because it's a little too hard with us only having a few lines of dialect to draw from. And there will be OOC'ness. Also Orihime wasn't kidnapped again by Stark, that **_**NEVER**_** happened in this story. Just as a disclaimer, I sadly don't own any of the characters as of yet.

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Ichigo was lying on the ground with Orihime's Sōten Kisshun glowing above him; he had been pretty seriously injured from two back to back espada battles. Ichigo had been cut up, bruised, broken, suffered mental and emotional trauma, and drained of will and reiatsu. His life pretty much sucked right now. On the bright side, his pain was lessening with each second spent under Orihime's Sōten Kisshun, as well as his body getting patched together again. Retsu, along with Isane, were tending to the other injured, while the other shinigami were talking about something. A few moments later Orihime had finished healing Ichigo. Ichigo got up and said "Thanks Inoue." Ichigo then went over to where the other shinigami were heatedly discussing something.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean!?!" shouted Renji, obviously the hot-headed one.

"What's what supposed to mean?" asked Ichigo as he joined the group.

"Freaking clown face over there just said that we're trapped here!" Renji shouted at Ichigo. At the name clown face Ichigo chuckled to himself. He hated clowns.

"So now what do we do?" inquired Ichigo.

"We wait," replied Mayuri.

"Why can't we just make another garganta?" asked Ichigo, still out of the loop.

"We can't because we're shinigami, and it would be nearly impossible to create another artificial garganta because we would need very large quantities of hollow reiatsu and the necessary reflectors and focusers," said Mayuri.

"Couldn't we just force any old arrancar or menos to open one for us?" asked Ichigo, having the same idea as Byakuya, though half an hour later.

Mayuri sighed, "We can't, because only an espada of rank, at the very least mind you, five would be able to open one strong enough to support several captain class spirit beings."

"Hmm, that is a problem," said Ichigo, while trying to think of a way to get back to the human realm. While Ichigo was thinking the other shinigami continued to debate about what they should do. A few minutes later, Ichigo glanced around the area hoping, but not expecting, to find some sort of inspiration for an idea. All he saw as was miles of sand, broken buildings, and a few intact structures, that is, until his gaze fell on a sleeping child, Nel.

"That's it!" said Ichigo slamming his fist into an upturned palm.

Now it was Renji's turn to ask, "What's what?"

"I just had an idea of how we can get out of here!" said Ichigo with a smug grin plastered on his face.

Mayuri sighed again, "And what is your brilliant plan?"

"We can use her," Ichigo said pointing over his shoulder to Nel's sleeping form.

"Ichigo she barely has any reiatsu, so how could she possibly open a garganta strong enough for us?" asked Renji after sizing up the child's power.

"Because," said Ichigo ignoring Renji's outburst, which entailed that that didn't answer his question, Ichigo continued on with his idea. "Mayuri," just his name sent a shiver down Ichigo's spine, "if Nel was transformed into a child because her mask was cracked open, then would it be possible to change her back?"

As Ichigo told Mayuri this, he got where Ichigo was going with this. If Ichigo was right then the shrinking of the spiritual body would cause a drastic dip, no, not just a dip, but rather a plummet in power. So it was feasible that she could be powerful enough in her adult form to open a strong enough garganta. "It depends, it may or may not be possible, if it was just the physical act of the mask breaking then all you'd have to do is fix the mask, if the reiatsu was leaking out then you'd have to 'inflate' her with reiatsu, but if it was something deeper then it may not be possible."

"She did transform back temporarily before," Ichigo said absently while thinking.

"If she transformed back then we just need to inflate her," spoke Mayuri still contemplating of how this could work.

"Perfect, how do we do that?" questioned Ichigo.

Mayuri said "All you'd have to do is find an opening to, for a lack of a better word, shove tons of reiatsu into her. The best place to do this would probably be the crack in her mask."

"Got it," commented Ichigo while walking over to Nel, who was still sleeping.

Mayuri just thought of a major insurmountable problem, "Hey, we would need a combination of shinigami _and_ hollow reiatsu to even have a chance of making this work!"

"So…" said Ichigo oblivious, in the eyes of the others, to the obvious problem. Maybe he wasn't oblivious to the problem, maybe the obvious problem, wasn't a problem.

"So? We don't have said hollow reiatsu," Mayuri said while simultaneously being amazed by the orange haired kid's stupidity.

"So?" replied Ichigo.

"Are you touched in the head boy?!?" shouted Mayuri getting frustrated with the boy.

"No, besides it'll work. My reiatsu is quite similar to an arrancar's," said Ichigo as he walked over to Orihime. "Orihime, could you heal Nel's mask just so that there is a small crack left about the size of my index and middle finger?"

"I can try," said Orihime a little unconfident in her own abilities.

"Good," said Ichigo as he nudged Nel awake.

Nel glanced up at Ichigo with weary eyes, "Itsygo,"

"It's alright, Orihime will fix your mask," replied Ichigo in tender big-brother tone.

Nel didn't reply instead looked to Orihime and asked incredulously "You could really fix my mask?"

"I think so," answered Orihime, "Sōten Kisshun, I reject!" The golden light of the oval engulfed Nel, for a few moments the mask was unresponsive to the healing and Orihime was going to stop, then it started to bubble at the crest of the crack. Nel looked up at her mask crossed eyed trying, but not succeeding, in seeing the crack. The oozing liquid filled down the crack slowly, closing the fissure in her mask as it went. Orihime stopped when the bubbling white fluid started to get close to the end of the break leaving just enough room for two fingers to fit inside, somewhat.

Ichigo stepped up to Nel and explained to her what he was about to do. He didn't mention exactly why, since she didn't have any memory of her time as an adult, even the short time when she fought Nnoitra on Ichigo's behalf. Nel just nodded and agreed to it. Ichigo then took his middle and index fingers and lightly jammed them into the remaining part of the crack; he then started to pump his own reiatsu into Nel. "Hey how much reiatsu should I put in her?" asked Ichigo.

Mayuri sighed, then said "If you're going to waste your reiatsu th-"

"Just answer the damn question!" shouted Ichigo.

Mayuri yet again sighed, "Just keep going until she transforms back."

"Alright," replied Ichigo. "Oh yeah, all of you go try to find some clothes for her."

The main group* just nodded and did their various versions of shunpo and went off to the surrounding buildings in search of clothes. The captains just stood there. One of the captains, Byakuya, asked why they should go too. Ichigo just responded with eloquent sarcasm "Hmm I think it's because a small robe that barely fits a child will fit just perfectly on a fully grown adult." The captains just replied with a reluctant 'Fine' and then shunpoed off.

For some reason Mayuri didn't go with the rest of the captains and instead walked over to where Ichigo was, "I know you aren't a shinigami, and when I prove it I will so enjoy experimenting on you." And with that ominous remark shunpoed away. Now Ichigo _really _hated clowns.

Orihime was walking towards one of the buildings and when she got inside it was very dark. She stumbled around in there until she found the light switch**, which she turned on. The new light revealed that she was in some kind of warehouse/storage building. All around her there were wooden boxes stacked on top of one another in a grid pattern. As Orihime walked through the warehouse she began to notice that the wooden crates were labeled with various things like "Vases" and "Tiles". When she worked her way around to the other side of the building she came in she found that a large portion of the wall was blown inwards by some sort of blast. The blast had caused vast amounts of debris and sand to flood into the otherwise clean and orderly building. Orihime gingerly picked her way through the debris field and when she got past it she stopped paying close attention to the floor, instead fixing her gaze on the 20 yard high walls of wooden crates. She tripped over a rock that was thrown over to its current position, she face planted. When Orihime got up again she noticed a broken crate that had tumbled over here, its label was partially snapped, but was clearly meant to say "Neliel." "Yay!" said Orihime as she peered inside of the crate. She found a whole lot of torn and battered clothes, probably caused by the ruff tumble it took; she dug through it and eventually found a shirt, pants, shoes, and a sash for her zanpakuto. Orihime gathered up said items and headed back to where Ichigo was.

When Orihime arrived she found that in a medium sized sphere around Ichigo and Nel the spiritual was utterly crushing, the concentration of reiatsu was so high that everything inside looked like it was under water. Even the captains didn't' stray too far close to the sphere. Orihime at first made the mistake of entering the sphere, as soon as she entered she felt her chest tighten to the point of her ribs creaking, she then collapsed to the ground dropping the clothes she was carrying. Ichigo noticed her and between pants of exertion called Byakuya to take her out of the area. Byakuya hadn't gone into the sphere yet and when he did, he felt like an enormous weight was pressing down on him, his movements became sluggish and he was winded after just 3 seconds within the sphere. Thankfully he could still move, albeit very slowly and jerkily. Byakuya grabbed Orihime and staggered out of the reiatsu field, after which he collapsed. Retsu shunpoed over to were Orihime and Byakuya collapsed, gave them a once over and told everyone they'd be fine, just an overdose of reiatsu. Ichigo let out a sigh of relief, he wouldn't be able to forgive himself if Orihime was hurt, especially by his own reiatsu. When Renji came back he saw that Orihime had actually found better clothes than he had, the disappointment showed on his face that Nel, whatever she may look like as an adult, wouldn't have to wear a pair of Habiel's clothes that he had found. Shortly after that, Ichigo could feel Nel start to hum with power, she continued to let out a high pitched drone, then suddenly without warning a large pink explosion was loosed from Nel.

The resulting shockwave knocked everyone, save Ichigo, back 10 or so feet. Ichigo went 25. As the dust settled a lone female silhouette started to form. When the figure was revealed, it was adult Nel in a tattered two-piece. Nel scanned the group calmly, mentally flagging each individual as friend, foe, or unknown. Her gaze then fell on Ichigo buried head first in a sand dune up to his waist, leaving his flailing legs above the sand. Nel sonidoed over to where Ichigo was then pulled him out of the sand. As Nel flew by she was so fast that the captains lost track of her until she stopped by Ichigo pulling him out of the sand. Nel then proceeded to hug the life out of Ichigo while rapidly apologizing for blowing him into a sand dune. Everyone sweat dropped at the seemingly mature and stoic arrancar's present behavior. Someone even went as far as to say "Eh…"

It was then that a strong breeze blew through. This seemingly innocent force of nature caused a chain of events that would put other natural disasters to shame. The wind picked up Nel's hair and raised it off of her back, in the process revealing her "3" tattoo in all of its ominous glory. At first it didn't register with the shinigami, Chad, and Ishida. A split second later they all drew their various weapons on Nel and told her to step away from Ichigo.

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**A/N: *For all intents and purposes the main group consists of Ichigo, Chad, Ishida, Rukia, Renji, and Orihime. **Yes Las Noches (the land of nachos) has electricity and lights. **

**Alright, here is the completely rewritten chapter one, hope you like it. Anyway, **when** I wrote that Nel began to hum with power, I didn't mean that she started to hum a song, but rather a drone started to emanate from her. Please R&R!**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Back again with another chapter, and in case you didn't read my reviews of my own story, you wouldn't have know where to see the pics I wanted you to see. Alright this is how you'll be able to see them, go to: deviant art [DOT] com; (no spaces). Then use the search feature, and search for "IchixNell-Here to Protect You" (no quotes). That's one of them, to see the other you'll need to click on the link in the artist's description. Also just as a reminder, the original concept for this story was made up by *vinrylgrave of deviant art, I have received his blessing for writing this fanfic on his behalf. Also bless Tite Kubo's (I believe that's how you spell his name) little heart for creating bleach, and also curse him for not giving me the rights to his characters :'( (by the way that's a tear coming from my eye). And for the most part I will be referring to Neliel as Nel, I will also not be using honorifics (i.e. –chan, -san, -dono,-sama, ect.), in my opinion it just makes the sentences flow more easily. Also words in **_**italics like this**_** after the recap are people's thoughts. **

_Recap:_ _As Neliel looked around for Ichigo, she spotted him 25 feet away rammed head first into a mound of sand. She sonidaed__** (A/N: past tense of sonida (the hollow version of shunpo).)**__ over to where Ichigo was and pulled him out of the sand repeatedly hugging him and saying how sorry she was for blowing him into a hill of sand, as the rest of the others just looked at her with "eh…" looks on their faces, when a breeze came by and Nel's hair was lifted up to reveal her tattoo. Suddenly the tension in the air got bumped up a few notches as the captains, their lieutenants, Rukia, and Renji all pulled their zanpaktou on Nel._

**Chapter 2**

Nel immediately felt the shimigami's glares cutting into her back, and got serious as she tilted her head to the left and gazed at the shimigami, sizing up their power. Nel let go of Ichigo, and stood up and locked on to her first target, Byakuya. In the blink of an eye she unsheathed her zanpaktou and sonidaed over to where Byakuya was standing and struck the ground with such force that it caused a huge crater to form directly where Byakuya was standing just a few milliseconds before. _Damn I can barely keep up with her! _ Thought Byakuya as he got knicked in dozens of places on his face from the flying sand and the `air cutter` created from the force of Nel's zanpaktou. "Scatter Senbon Zakura," said Byakuya. Just before his zanpaktou scattered into its deadly flying razors, a long length of cloth wrapped around his katana and a large cresant moon-shaped blade with a glowing blue edge was placed in front of him and the other captains. (I don't know if I mentioned it, but Ichigo is in shikai at the moment) _Tch, at point blank range none of us would have time to dodge and if he fired now we'd be killed, _thought Byakuya he stared at the glowing blue light.

"Alright everyone just, stop! Okay?" Ichigo yelled at the shimigami and Nel "Nel, we need you to open a garganta to the real world for us to get back since Aizen trapped us here, can you do it?"

"Yeah, but tell them to sheath their zanpaktou if you want me to open it," Nel said as she slowly sheathed her zanpaktou.

"You heard her guys, put away your zanpaktou," Ichigo said at them. The shimigami hesitantly sheathed their zanpaktou.

"I can't sheath mine if you don't unravel your zanpaktou's cloth from it," said Byakuya calmly with a hint of venom.

"Oh, yeah sure," said Ichigo as he unraveled Zangetsu's cloth sheath from senbon followed through on his unspoken promise to sheath his katana.

Orihime ran up to Nel and handed her the now neatly folded clothes she found, "here Nel."

"Oh thanks Orihime," Nel said sweetly while taking her old clothes. "Here take this," she then said and threw her sheathed zanpaktou at Ichigo, who just looked at it confused. He was about to ask why, but something stopped him dead in his tracks. Right in front of everyone, Nel started to strip off her tattered tunic/robe-thing, and most of the guys got a nose bleed. Ichigo went berserk.

"Wait Nel you're not going to do that in front of everyone-"Ichigo started to say before she took off her top.

"Why?" she said uncaringly as she slid off her the rest of her top and slipped on her old shirt.

"Because people shouldn't see you like that-" Ichigo managed to stammer out before Nel slid off what was left of tunic/robe. Now all of the guys had a nose bleed going, and even one of the girls had one had one** (A/N: bet you can't guess who!)**. She then pulled on her pants **(A/N: people in Hueco Mundo go commando?!?) **and put on her shoes and took her zanpaktou from Ichigo, which she promptly strapped on to her waist with her sash.

"Alright, I'm ready just tell me where you need to get to in the real world and I'll open a garganta to it," Nel said as she thought _Man! It feels good to be back in my old clothes; hmm I wonder where Orihime found them_.

"We need to get to Karakura Town," said Byakuya taking charge.

"Ok, then I'll get on it, it should be done in about 2-3 minutes since I don't know where that is so I have to try and track the other espada's gargantas," said Nel as she stepped away from the group and started her search for the other espada's gargantas.

**With the magic of writing those 3 minutes pass by in a flash!**

"Alright, got it," Nel shouted to the others. As the group moved over to where she was, she said "good news and bad news, which do you, want to hear first?"

"Good news," replied Byakuya.

"Well the good news is that they took a really long route to Karakura Town, it'll take them about a week to get there, and I can make a shorter route," Nel said to Byakuya.

"The bad news?" asked Byakuya.

"The bad news is that if I make a shorter route it will become really dangerous for anyone crossing it, it'll probably cause at least 3 fatalities if any of you lose focus for an instant. However it will shave off about 6 ½ days," Nel said somberly.

"Use the shorter route," Byakuya said with finality.

"Ok then," Nel said as she focused her reiastu to open the garganta. When it opened a few seconds later they could hear the agonizing screams of those who tried to take shortcut and got their soul trapped in there forever tormented by demons more vicious than hollow.

"What are those sounds?" asked Renji nervously.

"They are the pained screams of those who lost focus while trying to take a shortcut and where ravaged by demons. They are forever trapped in there without the blessing of death and are tormented by the demons for the rest of eternity," Nel said as she shivered about the thought of being trapped in there. Renji gulped. "You still sure you want to use the shortcut?"

"Absolutely," Byakuya replied with determination raging in his voice.

"Alright," Nel said and took a step toward the garganta she created, when Byakuya grabbed her shoulder and pulled her away from the garganta and said, "No, you will not be coming. You are an enemy, and consider us not killing you as payment for opening the garganta for us."

"Well what if I close it on you while you're still in it?" Nel sneered at Byakuya.

"You won't because your "friends" will be in the lead and in the rear of us," Byakuya said with lots of venom right in Nel's face.

Ichigo took the opportunity that arose because of Nel and Byakuya arguing, and took Orihime out of earshot of the others and told her "I'm going to be staying her in Hueco Mundo with Nel to help protect her until she finds a place to live in peace, I also want to see if she can help me with my hollow powers. Don't say anything to the shimigami from soul society except Renji and Rukia; also tell Ishida and Chad my plan. Tell them to keep it a secret. Can you do that for me?" Ichigo asked Orihime.

"I guess I can," Orihime said sadly "how long to you plan to stay here?"

"Just until I can master some of my hollow abilities and I find Nel a place to live since she's a traitor to Aizen and the espada now."

"I see," said Orihime averting her gaze.

"Don't worry I'll defiantly come back, ok?" Ichigo said to her.

"Ok," said Orihime recovering from her sadness.

"Alright let's head back to the others before they notice we're gone."

"Right."

Ichigo and Orihime went back and blended back into the group before anyone noticed they were gone.

"Orihime and Ishida! Go into the garganta now." Byakuya ordered pulling out senbon zakura. Since they knew that they couldn't overpower Byakuya and the other captains they did as they were told and went into the garganta. Next the shimigami all went in except Rukia and Renji, who were ordered to stay behind until all the captains and lutenates went in, and then go in with Chad and Ichigo bringing up the rear. They also did as they were told. When it came time for Ichigo to go through he just pushed captain Zaraki into the garganta and had Nel seal it on this end **(A/N: Not sure if this is possible in the actual anime, but it is here. Also this didn't collapse the entire hole.)**

"Why'd you have me seal it? Now you can't get back home," Nel asked Ichigo.

"It's because I'm going to stay here with you to protect you from the espada and Aizen," Ichigo said with conviction and resolve burning in his eyes. Nel ran up to him and hugged him so hard that Ichigo could hear his bones creak and crack under the strain. "Thanks Ichigo," Nel said as she released him.

"Its alright Ichigo said as he put his hands on his back and tried to uncompress the disks in his back from the force of Nel's killer hug.

**A/N: well this was the longest chapter I've ever written for any of my stories, so I hope you liked it. Also don't forget to check out those pics by *vinrylgrave. Also try to guess which girl got a nosebleed from Nel.**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: OK, I'm really sorry about how long it's taken me to update, but I just sorta lost my inspiration for the story until the mangas recently started refocusing on the battles in hueco mundo. I'm also really sorry about how badly the last chapter has been written and hopefully my new writing style will be a bit better (albeit it is similar to the previous, but hopefully it will address most of the bad stuff you guys have pointed out with the other chapters). By the way, I really don't like Nel's voice in the anime, so for all intents and purposes imagine it a little bit deeper, more like a normal anime girl's voice because I just can't stand how high pitched it is. In case I haven't mentioned it, Nel is wearing the outfit that she's wearing in *vinrylgrave's "IchiXNell-Here to Protect You" piece. Thanks to** **Surfer Tsunamiya, it's been brought to my attention that there is a plot hole with orihime being kidnapped before the "Aizen has trapped us here!" bit, so for the sake of simplicity, I'm just going to go ahead and say that orihime wasn't kidnapped after Ichigo rescued her. Also if there is any number of asterisks after a word like this: blahblahblah*, that means that the author note that would go there will instead be in the bottom author notes so it doesn't break the 4****th**** wall as badly. I would also like to address the captains not being all in the same place, but after the battles were finished wouldn't they like regroup or something? If you don't think they would, well they did. Just in case you haven't figured it out already, there ****WILL**** be ooc'ness. And one last note, the reason they didn't want Neliel's help is because byakuya made the decision, his pride wouldn't let him accept help from a hollow, or arrancar in this case.

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_Recap: "Orihime and Ishida! Go into the garganta now." Byakuya ordered pulling out senbon zakura. Since they knew that they couldn't overpower Byakuya and the other captains they did as they were told and went into the garganta. Next the shimigami all went in except Rukia and Renji, who were ordered to stay behind until all the captains and lieutenants went in, and then go in with Chad and Ichigo bringing up the rear. They also did as they were told. When it came time for Ichigo to go through he just pushed captain Zaraki into the garganta and had Nel seal it on this end. "Why'd you have me seal it? Now you can't get back home," Nel asked Ichigo._

"_It's because I'm going to stay here with you to protect you from the espada and Aizen," Ichigo said with conviction and resolve burning in his eyes. Nel ran up to him and hugged him so hard that Ichigo could hear his bones creak and crack under the strain. "Thanks Ichigo," Nel said as she released him._

"_It's alright," Ichigo said as he put his hands on his back and tried to uncompress the disks in his back from the force of Nel's killer hug.

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**Chapter 3**

"So, Ichigo," Nel started "where are we going to go?"

"Don't know," Ichigo said as they slowly walked towards one of Las Noches's gates. "Probably going to wander for a while until we can find someplace to settle down and hide."

"Sounds like a decent plan," replied Nel. "Think we should sonida over to the gate?"

"Sure," said Ichigo as he shunpoed over to the gate in a matter of milliseconds. Nel did the same except she sonidaed. As they exited Las Noches they came face to face with a desert that seemed to stretch forever in every direction. They started to walk away in a random direction.

A few days later, they arrived at some small stone ruins. The ruins were about 30 yards around and were made up of small stone pillars with larger stone slabs resting on top of them. About a third of the pillars and slabs had already fallen, while most of the rest were slanting almost to the point of falling over. "Well I guess we can stay here a while," commented Ichigo as he looked over the ruins.

"Yeah, it should do for a while," Nel said as she too looked over the ruins. After a short break from walking for several days straight, they both got on the job of cleaning up their new base of operations/hideout. Several hours later that had finished restoring the skeletal ruins into more of a solid structure that would help block out some of the rolling sand storms hueco mundo experienced.

Ichigo had set up a campfire, after going into the menos forest and chopping up some of the tree things for wood. Nel was sitting across from Ichigo on the opposite side of the fire, and was wondering where they would stay since soul society wouldn't accept them now, and neither would Las Noches. "Hey Ichigo, what are you going to do now that you're a criminal in the soul society's eyes?" Nel asked.

"Don't know, probably just lie low until they realize I'm not a threat," Ichigo said while stoking the fire with a stick. "Or I guess I'll live as an outlaw like the other vizards in the real world."

"Sorry," Nel said sullenly while looking down at the fire.

"Sorry for what?" Ichigo asked.

"For putting you in this bind," Nel replied still sullen.

"Nel, you didn't force me to stay here, I chose to stay here with you," said Ichigo.

"I know, but if I weren't here you wouldn't have stayed," Nel uttered softly.

"Don't say it like it's your fault, if I had the chance to do it over again, I still would have chosen to stay here with you," Ichigo retorted.

Nel finally looked up from the ground and directly at Ichigo, "Thanks Ichigo."

The next day Ichigo and Nel woke up to find thousands of lesser hollow about 100 yards away completely surrounding their encampment. There was a single adjuchas only five yards away from them. It stood about six feet tall, had grayish purple skin, a tail about 4 feet long, and a mask shaped like the head of a hammer head shark. "Finally you're awake," the hollow hissed. ˈ_Until now the hollow have completely avoided us, so what the hell is an adjuchas doing challenging __us__?ˈ_ thought Ichigo.

"What the hell do you want?" Ichigo spat out.

"I'm here to bring you back to Aizen," replied the hollow while licking its eyeballs.

ˈ_Obviously this guy wasn't sent by Aizen, there's no way in hell anyone in Las Noches would think a single adjuchas could overpower both the former third espada and a vizard who's killed a bunch of high ranking arrancar,ˈ _thought Nel. "Good luck," started Nel, "you want him or should I?" Nel asked Ichigo.

"Its fine I got him, you can go back to sleep," said ichgo as he grabbed zangetsu in its shikai form and walked towards the adjuchas. "Any last words?"

"Hehehehe I should be asking _you_ that, shinigami!" retorted the adjuchas as he lunged forward with his hand outstretched, claws beared. Ichigo took zangetsu and thrust it forward impaling the adjuchas's head and mask. The adjuchas just stood there with zangetsu stuck in his head when Ichigo loosed a Getsuga Tenshou* slicing the adjuchas in half. Ichigo started to walk away when the two halves of the adjuchas regrew their other half, the adjuchas was laughing wildly now, "Is that the best you've got, shinigami?!?"

"Tch. Not even close," Ichigo said as he shot off a very large Getsuga Tenshou, completely vaporizing both adjuchases. Ichigo once again started to walk away when he heard the maniacal laugh of the adjuchas again, now there were four of them. "Ugh, damn it!" shouted Ichigo as he turned around and shot of a Getsuga Tenshou so large it was comparable in size to a skyscraper. This once again vaporized the four laughing adjuchases, which once again duplicated, this time into eight adjuchases.

Ichigo could hear Nel tell him that he'd have to completely destroy the adjuchas's spirit particles, which a Getsuga Tenshou from his shikai wasn't capable of. "Alright then, let's see how this bastard likes my bankai," said Ichigo as he shouted "Ban-kai!" All the while the adjuchas just kept cackling loudly. Ichigo lifted up tensa zangetsu and shouted "Getsuga Tenshou!" as he swung down. A huge burst of black and red reiatsu shot forward gouging a huge fissure into the land while slicing a large hole in the ring of surrounding hollow. Ichigo proceeded to loose another Getsuga Tenshou to wipe out the remaining lesser hollow when he heard a cackle again. "God Damn it!" Ichigo shout as he turned around to see only one adjuchas.

"Missed me!" taunted the adjuchas. It was at this moment that Ichigo decided that it was overkill time. He reached up to his face and summoned his hollow mask, leapt up into the air and started charging a Getsuga Tenshou so large that it blotted out the moon and cast a shadow a few miles in diameter**. As he charged it, it started spinning in a large circle with tentacle like arms rotating around it making it look like a large circle saw blade. Nel took notice of how much reiatsu was in that thing and decided it was best she wasn't hit with it, even though she was the former third espada, she knew she couldn't take a hit like that without dying several dozen times over. She took it upon herself to sonida away before Ichigo launched that monster. Ichigo finally shot the Getsuga Tenshou after about 5 minutes of charging it up, all the while the adjuchas just kept cackling, it came down with such force it instantly vaporized anything it came in contact with. It had completely destroyed any spirit particles it even touched and left a crater the size of Karakura town in diameter and 50 yards deep. The Getsuga Tenshou had been so hot, it turned all of the sand in and around the crater into a lime green glass. Ichigo fell out of the air as his mask crumbled away into noting, and landed face first into a bed of glass (ouch!) unconscious.

When Ichigo had finally come to, he found himself lying on some sand by new fire with Nel sitting by him munching something. Ichigo tried to sit up, but was too weak to move."How long?" Ichigo managed to say.

"Oh, Ichigo you're awake," Nel commented "it's been about a week."

"Damn, too long," Ichigo moaned.

"That's actually very good considering the amount of reiatsu you pumped into that Getsuga Tenshou," Nel said as she reached for something "here, eat. It will help you heal faster." She then handed Ichigo a large black chunk of something.

"Thanks, but I can't really move right now," Ichigo said as he chuckled a little to himself.

"Its fine, I'll feed you then," Nel said as she leaned over Ichigo and tore off a small chunk of the black thing and put it in his mouth. Ichigo chewed it a little and swallowed. Nel fed him another piece and it, he chewed and swallowed it, and so on until the hunk of black stuff was gone.

"That was actually pretty good, what was it?" Ichigo asked already starting to feel better after eating the black thing.

"It was a gillian that I compressed into a smaller chunk," Nel replied like it was no big deal.

"That black thing that I just ate was a hollow?" Ichigo asked with a tinge of anger in his voice as he sat up.

"Uh, yeah, is there something wrong with that?" Nel asked innocently.

"Uh, kind of," Ichigo started sarcastically "I don't eat other souls like a hollow."

"Yes, but you're a vizard, half hollow. So I figured that you're capable of eating a soul," Nel said starting to regret her choice of feeding Ichigo a gillian.

"What, there's no way I'd ever eat a soul," Ichigo retorted.

"Ichigo I meant you're physically capable of eating a soul," Nel said sadly "I just thought it would help you get better."

"Nel, I know you meant well, but please don't try to feed me a hollow again," Ichigo said soothingly as he took notice of Nel's somber look.

"OK," Nell said cheering up a little "but it did help quite a bit."

"I guess, but I just don't like the idea of eating another soul," Ichigo said as he tried to get up. He almost fell before he could get on his feet, but Nel caught him before he could fall and helped him to his feet. Ichigo took his first look around, he didn't see the crater that his Getsuga Tenshou would have made. So he asked Nel how they got here.

"I carried you on my back while I sonidaed away from that enormous crater you made, I'm guessing by now it's over run with lesser hollow," Nel answered.

"Why would lesser hollow be swarming around the crater?" Ichigo asked as he took a tentative step.

"The stronger of them would be looking for a body, and the weaker ones would be there to eat the spirit particle rich glass, and the even weaker ones would be there to filter out the spirit particles hanging in the air," Nel replied.

"Wow, never knew there were so many different types of hollow," Ichigo commented.

"Yeah, neither does most of soul society, if they actually could see beyond the face value of hollow they'd realize that hollow aren't all bad, if not for us hollow, the soul society would be overflowing with souls, and they wouldn't have the resources to support that many souls. Without hollow the delicate balance of souls would be tipped and would cause disaster and eventually the permanent destruction of all souls. Unfortunately the same thing goes for most hollow, they don't see the importance of the shinigami. So we kill each other over and over again in a never ending battle. Then there are the arrancar and the vizards, the grays in a world of blacks and whites, we truly should be able to bridge the gap between the shinigami and hollow, but neither the shinigami or the hollow truly like either the vizards or the arrancar, respectively." Nel said sullenly.

"Wow, I've never thought of it that way," Ichigo said while in deep thought.

"Sadly, almost nobody else has," Nel replied.

"I guess we'll have to make it a point to learn more about the other side," Ichigo said to Nel as they started walking.

"Yeah," Nel said.

"Maybe you could help me with my hollow powers and abilities, and I could help you with some of you shinigami powers," mused Ichigo.

"Sure, I don't have a lot of my shinigami powers realized yet much less mastered, and the same probably goes for you and your hollow powers," Nel said as she thought of all the shinigami powers she's wanted to try.

"Alright I guess we can get started on that once I finish regaining my strength," Ichigo said as they made their way back into their small camp. "I guess I can also try to eat a hollow again since we're trying to break down the boundaries between shinigami and hollow."

"I can also try to purify a hollow," Nel said. "But for now, I'll just go hunting."

"Alright, I'll go try to get some wood for the fire, since I'm starting to get some more strength back," Ichigo said before he and Nel went off in different directions. Little to Ichigo's knowledge after he ate that hollow, a small speck of white, barely the size of a fifth of a grain of rice, formed on the left side of his face on his hairline.

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**A/N: Alright there it is, chapter 3. Here's where the asterisk come into play, * Blue getsuga not the black one. ** This is supposed to be like the one Ichigo shot at Ulquiorra a while back, it looked like the spore logo except with more tentacle strand things. I really hope this chapter didn't seem rushed or like it was going too fast, this chapter now holds the record for the longest chapter I've ever written, at 2,772 words without author notes and recap and 2,138 words without. As always please read and review, the more reviews I get the faster I feel inclined to write another chapter ;)**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Yay people actually like my story! I've received a few anonymous reviews stating that either they didn't like the story or that there was something wrong with it, I don't mind constructive criticism, but unless you tell me what's wrong with the story or what you didn't like I can't fix it! So to any anonymous reviews in the future, since I can't reply to your review, please state what you didn't like or what was wrong with it. Also after rereading chapter 3 I noticed I forgot to capitalize Tensa Zangetsu and some other things like that. Also I personally didn't like how cheesy the ending of the last chapter was so please forgive the cheesiness! And to the reviewer who stated that the "trees" in the menos forest were crystal, not wood, here is my only response to that, I don't care. They're trees. Trees burn. End of story.

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_Recap: "Alright I guess we can get started on that once I finish regaining my strength," Ichigo said as they made their way back into their small camp. "I guess I can also try to eat a hollow again since we're trying to break down the boundaries between shinigami and hollow."_

"_I can also try to purify a hollow," Nel said. "But for now, I'll just go hunting."_

"_Alright, I'll go try to get some wood for the fire, since I'm starting to get some more strength back," Ichigo said before he and Nel went off in different directions. Little to Ichigo's knowledge after he ate that hollow, a small speck of white, barely the size of a fifth of a grain of rice, formed on the left side of his face on his hairline.

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_

Ichigo was standing holding out his index finger focusing reiatsu onto the tip of the finger where a red ball was forming. Nel was shouting out advice at him as he grunted in concentration , just as he tried to yell something at Nel the ball of red reiatsu destabilized and blew up in his face, literally. The force of the explosion sent Ichigo flying back about 20 feet. Ichigo stood up again brushed himself off as Nel ran up to him and said "You're getting better, but don't lose concentration. Try to focus and compress the reiatsu, and do it evenly. You do remember what happened when you compressed one side before the other, right?" Ichigo did remember, it nearly cost him a limb and made a huge crater.

"Argh! I just can't get it right! How do you do it?" Ichigo nearly shouted in frustration.

"Practice makes perfect Ichigo," Nel replied unhelpfully.

"Yeah, well to hell with practice!" Ichigo shouted as he raised his hand and without really knowing what he was doing, shot off a huge black cero straight at Nel.

Nel's eyes widened with shock and then she calmly lifted up her hand and momentarily stopped the cero, only to have it rear up and explode. While all of this happened Ichigo just stood there staring at his open palm. 'Shit, she's gonna kick my ass for that!' thought Ichigo. Nel was pushed back a few feet from the blast and had a few scrapes from the flying shrapnel caused by the explosion of Ichigo's unstable cero.

"What the hell Ichigo?!?" shouted an enraged Nel. Ichigo started to say that it was an accident, but Nel was already on him and mid way into a roundhouse kick, which was aimed at Ichigo's stomach. Ichigo never stood a chance. He got hit, and because of Nel's super human strength, got shot back 50 yards coughing up blood as he flew. He once again crashed into a sand dune. Nel just now realizing what she had done, rushed over to Ichigo and started to hug him saying that she was sorry. Ichigo, as was the norm with Nel's hugs, couldn't breathe and felt his bones start creaking under the pressure, which was not exactly helping with his already shattered rib cage. "Nel, your… cru… shing … me!" Ichigo managed to stammer out, before he felt one his rib fragments puncture his lung. Ichigo coughed out more blood as he felt his lung fill up with liquid. After Ichigo had coughed up a large quantity of blood Nel immediately released her hug on Ichigo, and quickly started to feel up Ichigo's mid section. What she found frightened her a little, she could feel several pieces of shattered bone, a few ribs protruding out, and one rib that had actually punctured the skin and was sticking out in the open. Nel decided that these kinds of injuries were out of the scope of her saliva's healing powers, so she laid Ichigo down on his back, and, for a lack of better words, drooled all over Ichigo's mid section. Nel thought that would at least stop the bleeding and maybe heal a bit of internal damage, although she knew that it wouldn't do anything for his obliterated rib cage. Nel told Ichigo that she'd be right back and then sonidoed away leaving Ichigo on his own.

Nel also knew that Ichigo's only hope for survival would to either go to the real world to see if orihime could heal him, which would take too long, or for him to consume a vast quantity of hollow, which would hopefully heal him enough for him to be stable. She decided on the latter and proceeded to the Menos Forest to hunt for some adjuchas class menos. Nel busted through the ceiling of sand, or to her the ground, and dropped down into the forest. She was in luck, there were a few adjuchases a mile or two away, she quickly sonidoed to where the adjuchases were. Nel had arrived and had already loped the head off of one of the 4 assembled adjuchas's head before any of them even noticed her. She then took out another hollow before it could react to her presence. This had by now given the other assembled hollow enough time to launch a counter attack on the green haired arrancar, not that it would do them any good. Within seconds Nel had disposed of all the adjuchases she quickly gathered up the concentrated remains and sonidoed back to Ichigo.

Ichigo was looking worse for wear; he was coughing up blood at least every 30 seconds now. "Ichigo, I'm back. Can you eat?"

"I *cough* think so," Ichigo replied uncertainly.

"Well then here try to eat," Nel said while handing him one of the four black spheres in her hand to him. Ichigo shakily raised his hand to grasp the black sphere and brought it to his mouth where he tried to chew it, but was too weak from the intense pain and blood loss to really chew it. Ichigo was about to voice his problem, when Nel suddenly leaned into a kiss. Ichigo instantly shot up from his laying position to a sitting up position. Bad move. He shot right back down as fast as he had come up with pain and fresh blood blossoming across his abdomen. Nel tried again and Ichigo finally realized her intent, it wasn't to kiss him, but to spit out the hollow that she had chewed for him into his mouth. That didn't do much for the blush that was plastered on his face, which as the feeding continued just grew larger and deeper in color. On the bright side Ichigo could actually feel his body starting to piece itself together again. Still unknown to Ichigo and Nel, the small speck of white on Ichigo's hairline also grew with each piece Ichigo consumed. When Ichigo had finished eating the four adjuchases, what was once a speck the size of a fifth of a grain of rice was now about the size of 2 grains of rice. His body also felt physically better and marginally more powerful. Nel told Ichigo that she was going to go hunting again since his wounds hadn't completely healed yet, and left off further than before.

Nel was making her way across the vast deserts of Hueco Mundo on her hunt for adjuchas class menos. She had already gone about 10 miles, and decided that this was as good of a place as any to enter the Menos Forest. When she emerged into the vast underground forest she instantly felt a crushing reiatsu, a vasto lorde's reiatsu. It had reiatsu similar in level to the 4th espada, she could take it. She shot off at the speed of sonido towards the source of the massive reiatsu. She arrived to see it killing and feasting upon a dozen unlucky adjuchases. It had pale white skin, with strange yellow markings forming weird swirl patterns on its body. Its mask looked like that of a grizzly bear, but with the muzzle of a hawk. The beak of the hawk also had dozens of serrated teeth running along the jaw lines. Its hands had large talon like claws on them as well. Aside from the odd shaped head, unusually pale white skin, the claws, and yellow swirl markings the hollow looked like a normal human. So far it hadn't noticed her, probably so engrossed into its task of feeding it wasn't really aware of its surroundings. Nel stalked as close as she dare before shooting off at the vasto lorde with Gazuma drawn and poised for action. The vasto lorde had just noticed her in time to dodge getting his head lopped off, although he wasn't able to completely dodge it, he did sustain a nasty cut to his bicep. "How dare you attack me like that!" screamed the vasto lorde as he clutched his bicep where he had been slashed. "I'll kill you!" roared the vasto lorde son doing toward Nel in a full frontal charge. Nel easily blocked the jab with Gazuma.

Gazuma's edge bit deep into the hand of the vasto lorde. "You're incredibly foolish to attack me straight on unarmed," said Nel calmly, which just had the effect of throwing the vasto lorde into an even greater frenzy, it wasn't used to pain.

"I'll fucking kill you for that!" yelled the vasto lorde while charging up a cero. Nel simply smiled. The vasto lorde shot a large yellow cero at Nel, who lazily put out a hand to halt the progress of the hollow's cero and started to suck it in. The vasto lorde was now laughing manically thinking that it had killed the arrancar. Once Nel had sucked in the entire cero she shot it back out at the vasto lorde adding on her own cero turning the entire thing a light violet color. The vasto lorde took notice of the large, blazing violet laser like burst flying at him. The vasto lorde tried to dodge it, but the cero was already too close. The vasto lorde took the full brunt of Nel's cero, including all the power he had just a few moments ago launched at her. Oh the irony. Nel wasn't as foolish as the vasto lorde in thinking that that would be enough to kill the other. At best it would cost him a limb, if she was lucky, and if she wasn't then it would have only caused a really bad bruise and dozens of small cuts.

It was her lucky day today. The vasto lorde had lost an arm. "You stupid bitch! Why won't you die?!?" screamed the vasto lorde partly in frenzied anger, agony, and insanity. It then shot off several hundred volleys of bala blasts where Nel was standing. Nel simply sonidoed out of the way, the vasto lorde kept of firing volley after volley directly where she was standing like 3 minutes ago. This hollow was so insane that it just kept firing at where she was as if she wouldn't move. It took all she had to stifle a fit of laughter at the hollow's stupidity. 'Well in the mean time I think I'll charge up a gran rey cero' thought Nel to herself as she brought her hand back and to her waist charging a large deep violet cero. The vasto lorde was so obsessed with firing bala blasts at the spot Nel was standing at 4 minutes ago didn't even notice the monstrous reiatsu forming into a cero directly 15 feet behind him. The vasto lorde was completely oblivious to the fully formed gran rey cero rearing and even emitting a high-pitched screech not 15 feet behind him as Nel thrust her hand forward launching a monster cero at point blank range and the hollow's back. The cero hit him and obliterated his legs and everything else below his navel. The hollow dropped from the air as the cero subsided, landing with a dull thud on the ground. Surprisingly when Nel walked over to the vasto lorde she discovered that it was still alive and laughing, swinging its only remaining arm like it was still hurling bala blasts at her. Nel just shook her head in disgust, this hollow reminded her greatly of Nnoitra, and then stabbed Gazuma at the vasto lorde's head; suddenly the vasto lorde came to its senses, and rolled out of the way of Gazuma. Nel's blade still stabbed trough his arm, but the wound wouldn't kill him. The vasto lorde suddenly released a large amount of reiatsu and to Nel's shock and horror, started to re-grow its limbs and torso. It had rapid regeneration. Nel leapt back as the vasto lorde lunged out at her with one of its clawed hands. The index claw grazed her shoulder before she could get out of the way.

Nel was getting a little worried now, it seemed to be regaining its sanity as the fight progressed, and soon it would be able to put up a decent fight. Even as she spoke Nel could feel the hollow's reiatsu rising, it was now somewhere between the third espada and the fourth espada, she had to end this quickly. Nel held out Gazuma in front of her horizontally and placed her left hand near the tip of the blade, "Declare, Gazuma!" A huge burst of light enveloped Nel, and the vasto lorde tried to lunge at her again. The vasto lorde was met with a large lance to the face. The hollow screamed in pure, bloodcurdling agony, and leapt back, he had a large stab wound on his face with blood pouring out of it. Before the vasto lorde's rapid regeneration could kick in to heal his wound, Nel brought back the lance that was Gazuma and shouted "Lanzador Verde" and launched Gazuma which now was spinning rapidly and glowing with reiatsu. The vasto lorde never even saw it coming, he no longer had eyes. He got nailed the full force of Lanzador Verde directly in the chest. The attack pushed him back about four yards then started to bite into his flesh like a drill, and completely went through him, in the process destroying his heart. Gazuma embedded itself into one of the trees of the forest, as Nel walked (galloped?) over to where the hollow lied dying, she sealed her resurrección form Gazuma was once again in its sheath at her waist. The hollow was slowly and painfully dying on the ground before her, as much as she hated to kill and fight, she had to kill this beast to allow Ichigo to live, so she drew Gazuma and stabbed her zanpakuto through the vasto lorde's head, instantly killing him. The vasto lorde was compressed into a tiny marble sized black bead. Nel picked it up and noticed that it was pulsing with reiatsu, she sonidoed back to where Ichigo was.

When she arrived Ichigo had at least stopped coughing up blood every few seconds, so that was a good sign. Nel popped the small marble like ball into her mouth and chewed it enough for Ichigo to swallow, and leaned in and fed Ichigo the vasto lorde. As soon as Ichigo had swallowed the hollow's remains he could feel tons of power rushing through him, healing his wounds completely. He felt about twice as powerful as before, with all of this new reiatsu. Now the mask fragment on Ichigo's hairline started to bubble and grow. Ichigo got up onto his feet and did something that surprised even him; he hugged Nel while simultaneously thanking her. Nel had a blush and a content smile plastered on her face as Ichigo hugged her. When he pulled away, Nel's content visage disintegrated into a look of shock. Without Ichigo even noticing it, the mask had grown to cover a little under a fourth of his face*, coving one of his eyes which caused both of his eyes to get the demonic yellow and black look to them. "Ichigo, your mask…" Nel said pointing at his mask.

"Hmm? What about it?" said Ichigo still oblivious to the mask.

"Its part way there," said Nel.

"What are you talking about Nel? I didn't call it out," said Ichigo starting to feel around his face. When his hand brushed the somewhat jagged edge of the mask shouted in horror, "Ah! What the hell!?!"

Nel walked up behind him and draped her arms around him and said seductively "It's alright Ichigo, it looks nice." This seemed to calm Ichigo down a little.

"Aren't you afraid of me now?" asked Ichigo uncertainly.

"Why would I be? I am a hollow after all, so seeing a mask on you doesn't scare me at all. In fact, I think it makes you look better," Nel whispered into his ear. Ichigo could feel Nel's hot breath tickle his ear.

"What are y-you do-doing Nel?" Ichigo stuttered.

"Nothing," Nel replied in her normal voice and released the hug. "Back to cero practice." Ichigo was completely dumbfounded by Nel's complete disregard for what had just happened and decided that it would be best just to go with the flow.

Ichigo got into position again and tried charging up a cero. To both their surprises it formed perfectly and remained stable even during it flight. Nel just smirked.

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**A/N: *this is like what his mask looks like on the here to protect you piece, excluding the jaw line mask fragment and it only just covered his eye. **

**Alright I hope you liked chapter four, and I'm really sorry for the late update. Anyway I am still in need of a beta or two, so any volunteers? Also to the anonymous reviewers out there without an account, either A) get one; or B) if you provide constructive criticism, or say that you don't like something, please tell me what it is and what I could to fix it. This is my first 3000+ word chapter, including recap and author notes it is 3163 words long and without them it is 2741 words long. Please review it's really not that hard and it inspires me.**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Alright here is chapter 5. Anonymous reviewers you're killing me with saying that you don't like something and not telling me what you didn't like, so please either get an account or tell me what you didn't like and/or how to fix it. Anyway, in case some of you are wondering, the romance will start to grow in this chapter eventually blossoming in a chapter or two. Just for the record I'm going to be calling Ichigo's inner hollow Hichigo, also I don't think I'm going to get Hichigo's way of talking right so, just kind of ignore any inconsistencies with his speech. I will also be explaining the tree issue due to popular demand. Just if your curious later about Nel's mood swings later in the chapter, it just might be "_that time of the month"_ for her (wink. wink. nudge. nudge.). Not a whole lot else to say here, except that just for the record Ichigo's cero is black, not red. Well on with the chapter.

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_Recap:_

"_Ichigo, your mask…" Nel said pointing at his mask._

"_Hmm? What about it?" said Ichigo still oblivious to the mask._

"_Its part way there," said Nel._

"_What are you talking about Nel? I didn't call it out," said Ichigo starting to feel around his face. When his hand brushed the somewhat jagged edge of the mask shouted in horror, "Ah! What the hell!?!"_

_Nel walked up behind him and draped her arms around him and said seductively "It's alright Ichigo, it looks nice." This seemed to calm Ichigo down a little._

"_Aren't you afraid of me now?" asked Ichigo uncertainly._

"_Why would I be? I am a hollow after all, so seeing a mask on you doesn't scare me at all. In fact, I think it makes you look better," Nel whispered into his ear. Ichigo could feel Nel's hot breath tickle his ear._

"_What are y-you do-doing Nel?" Ichigo stuttered._

"_Nothing," Nel replied in her normal voice and released the hug. "Back to cero practice." Ichigo was completely dumbfounded by Nel's complete disregard for what had just happened and decided that it would be best just to go with the flow._

_Ichigo got into position again and tried charging up a cero. To both their surprises it formed perfectly and remained stable even during it flight. Nel just smirked.

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It had been about a week and a half since Ichigo mastered cero, bala blasts soon followed. With the new power that eating the vasto lorde gave him, Ichigo had become about as powerful as the third or second espada. Nel was still teaching him some hollow abilities which included, but were not limited to, sonido, commanding Gillian, and discovering one of his unique hollow abilities. Nel had explained to him that a hollow will gain a new, and for the most part, unique ability with each power tier it reaches. In general, an adjuchas will have one, rarely having two; vasto lorde will usually have two, and again rarely three. Arrancar, since they gained large power boost from becoming arrancar, will sometimes gain one more unique ability, oddly the arrancar lose the ability to use these powers at will and have to re-obtain them. Although some vasto lorde will continue to consume other vasto lorde increasing their power, gaining more unique abilities as their power increased. Nel had guessed that at Ichigo's current power level he should have around three unique hollow abilities.

Ichigo had been wondering how he could actually tap into these unique abilities ever since Nel had mentioned them. He finally got tired of guessing how to use them and asked Nel, "Nel how do I use my unique abilities?"

"They'll come to you when they come," was Nel's cryptic answer.

"Nel, that doesn't help," Ichigo said slightly annoyed.

"Do you have any idea of what one of your powers may be?" Nel asked.

"Hmm," Ichigo muttered as he thought back. He remembered back when he had first obtained his hollow mask that the vizards told him that he was a pain in the ass to fight since he had rapid regeneration. "Oh, I know, the other vizards said that I had rapid regeneration when I fully transformed into a hollow."

"Perfect," Nel said as she sonidoed in front of Ichigo and slashed his chest open with Gazuma. Nel knew that it would be fatal if untreated or if his rapid regeneration didn't kick in, although she could stop the bleeding with her saliva.

Ichigo fell backwards into the sand and gurgled his own blood that had risen into his throat. 'Damn it this is gonna be fatal.' For about 3 seconds he just laid there choking on his own blood and watching Nel watch him die. He could see blackness eating away at his vision and thought 'Shit, I guess this is the end. Why Nel, why?' That was until he then heard an insane laughter seeming to come from everywhere, but at the same time nowhere.

Nel was about to heal him when an eruption of white _stuff_ came out of Ichigo's wound and it closed it. He got up and screamed "What the Fuck Nel?"

"I just awoke your rapid regeneration for you," Nel replied a little too nonchalantly for Ichigo's taste.

"You could have killed me if—" he was interrupted by Nel.

"Ichigo, the only way for a power to awaken is for it to be needed, would you have rather died on the battle field waiting for it to awaken or have it awoken here under controlled circumstances?" Nel asked harshly.

"I still could have died!" Ichigo threw back.

"I could have stopped the bleeding with my saliva," Nel countered.

"Fine," said Ichigo and shunpoed away.

Nel felt kind of bad about the whole thing especially now that Ichigo had run away, but she knew he'd be back because Zangetsu was still lying in the sand at their temporary encampment.

Ichigo had shunpoed about a mile away and was grumbling to himself about Nel when an adjuchas shot out of the sand and lunged at him. Ichigo didn't even bat it a second glance before he shot a bala at it. The bala hit the lone adjuchas dead center in the chest and tore through it. The adjuchas turned a glowing mass of black then compressed into a small ball. Ichigo went to go pick it up when a dozen more adjuchases shot out of the sand, one of them mumbled, "Damn it where the hell did he go?"

The adjuchas who was talking to himself started to growl when he saw Ichigo and the small black ball that was once his ally. The others followed his lead and they all formed a circle around Ichigo. Ichigo looked at them all sizing up each of their powers and deciding that he could handle them without Zangetsu. He charged up two ceros in his hands and quickly brought both of his hands up and spun 180 degrees firing the two ceros at the circle of adjuchases reducing them all to gently pulsating black orbs.

Ichigo was once again attempting to pick up his prizes, but was again interrupted by the appearance of a hollow. This time it was a vasto lorde. The hollow's power was just that of the minimum of that to be a vasto lorde, so its power was about that of the 6th espada. 'If I had Zangetsu this battle would be a push over.' Ichigo thought then crouched into a fighting position. "Did you do this?" the hollow said as he gestured to the black orbs surrounding Ichigo. Ichigo only nodded. "Then you'll have to suffer the consequences," replied the weak yet arrogant vasto lorde as he too crouched into a battle position.

The vasto lorde then committed the cardinal sin of fighting, he made the first move. He lunged out at Ichigo a cero forming in his hand. Ichigo stood stock still until a millisecond before the cero charged fist hit him in the chest then shunpoed to the side of the hollow and snatched the vasto lorde's wrist out of the air and gave it a sharp twist to both the right and left. The hollow screamed out in pain as the cero destabilized and exploded taking off both Ichigo's and the hollow's right and left arm respectively. The hollow again howled in pain as did Ichigo. It was then that his arm started to bubble at the base and a new arm sprung out. Just because it would re-grow doesn't mean that it didn't hurt like mother. The hollow wasn't as lucky, he kept bleeding profusely from the stump of his left arm. "You. Will. Pay. For. That!" snarled the injured vasto lorde and launched hundreds of bala blasts at Ichigo. Ichigo started shunpo around the deranged hollow as it kept shooting off hundreds of balas at him. He once again found himself thinking that if he had Zangetsu with him this would be an easy fight. Ichigo then started to fire his own balas at the hollow, their balas collided mid flight and fought with each other before Ichigo's overpowered the vasto lorde's. Ichigo wasn't firing as many as the vasto lorde, but that was because he charged them for longer periods of time allowing his to blast through the hollow's. He eventually landed a few blows, but then again so did the hollow. The balas to these two did little other than burn them, but in Ichigo's case the burns just healed immediately. "Teme!" the hollow hissed angrily. The hollow sonidoed in front of Ichigo when he wasn't paying close attention, for Ichigo time seemed to slow down as he saw the hollow with a cero pulsating in his hand, which was aimed directly at his head. He knew that if that cero hit, rapid regeneration or not, he wasn't getting back up. He tried to move, but he wasn't fast enough. Time seemed to slow down even further, and then the color drained away so that he now viewed the world in black and white, next time stopped. Ichigo could still move, but he knew that he would be back where he started when this experience ended. He looked around and saw his inner hollow descend out of the air seeming to appear from nowhere.

"Hey kingy, how yer doin?" Hichigo said with malice.

"Piss off," Ichigo snarled at his hollow.

"That's no way to be talkin to yer zanpakuto," comment Hichigo in an off handed way while shrugging. "Especially when I came to help you."

"I don't need your help, and besides, why would you even remotely want to help me?"

"You seem to forget this a lot kingy, we share the same body; you die, I die. It's as simple as that."

"Well like I said before, I don't need your help."

"Yes you do, just look over there." Hichigo then pointed to a static image of Ichigo which had a cero coming from in front of him about to hit his head.

"I've got rapid regeneration, so, no, I don't need your help." Ichigo said although he knew that rapid regeneration wouldn't make a difference.

"Even with rapid regeneration, you lose your head and even you aren't getting back up."

"Fine I'll take your help."

"Excellent, all you need to do is score a hit on me and I'll give my help."

"Fine by me."

"Oh, and the thing is, you still won't have Zangetsu, but I will," said Hichigo as he pulled Zangetsu out of nowhere and through it at Ichigo by the cloth wrapping.

"Shit!" commented Ichigo before sprawling to the ground as Zangetsu soared over his head. Hichigo just chuckled. Immediately Hichigo jerked back on the wrapping and then swung his arm in a downward diagonal arch. Zangetsu jerked to a stop and then flung down toward Ichigo who was still on the ground. Ichigo said something as he rolled away from Zangetsu, but it was lost in the explosion of sand. Ichigo quickly laid down a covering fire of balas for himself and got up. He kept up the barrage until Hichigo started to throw blue Getsuga Tenshos at him disrupting the balas. The power of Ichigo's small balas was less than that of Zangetsu's Getsuga Tenshos, so the Getsugas just kept cutting through wave after wave of balas. Eventually Ichigo thought 'Screw this.' and stopped firing balas with his left hand, but continued at a much faster pace with his right hand. In his left hand he started to charge up a large cero, but tried to keep it hidden by all of the balas and Getsugas. Because of all of this spiritual waffle even _he _couldn't even feel its spiritual pressure, and he was just a foot away! He gave it a while to get it up to its upper limits of power before he launched it, and when he did, it shot off with the ever prominent drone that sounded suspiciously like a hollow's roar. The cero sped through the Getsuga and bala infested middle ground slicing through everything it came in contact with ease.

A few milliseconds later the cero appeared in Hichigo's line of sight. Now it was Hichigo's turn to say, "Shit!" as the cero slammed into his side tearing away a large chunk of his torso. "Looks like you win again kingy," said Hichigo as he faded away and Ichigo suddenly was back to where he started, but he could feel something was different as time slowly but surely reinstated itself.

As the vasto lorde came back into full motion Ichigo lifted up his hand and tensed his fingers into a claw like position and shouted "Cero Kakiyosemasu!" and swung his hand downward. Ichigo didn't really know what it would do, but he knew that this was the help his hollow had given him. As he swung his hand downward the tips of his fingers briefly glowed red and then left a trace behind which shot out towards the vasto lorde. The red lines collided with the vasto lorde and sizzled for a split second then sliced through him! The red lines continued on until the hit the sand which exploded out ward from the impact. Ichigo looked down at the ground right below where the beams sliced through the vasto lorde and saw a black, quickly pulsating orb. "Damn," said Ichigo at what had happened to the hollow and the large gouges the red beams had made in the ground. He went to pick up the vasto lorde's remains when he heard someone come out of a sonido behind him. "Damn it! Not again!" he said as he turned. He expected to see another enemy, but instead it was Nel.

"What's not again?" she asked with the faintest hint of a smile.

"Fucking adjuchases and a vasto lorde just popped out of that sand and started attacking me!" Ichigo said.

Nel smirked, "Did anything eventful happen?"

"Yeah my hollow gave me more of his power," said Ichigo as he lifted up his hand to fire off another Cero Kakiyosemasu. The small red dots formed and charged nearly instantaneously and fired off as Ichigo swung his hand down. "See?"

"Hmm, what's it called?" Nel asked

"Cero Kakiyosemasu."

"Cero Raker?"

"Think so."

"So by the looks of it, that's your second unique ability."

"Probably."

"It appears to give you instant ceros with more destructive power along with less reiatsu consumed."

"How'd you figure all of that out?"

"My pesquisa is quite powerful."

"I see," said Ichigo as he finally picked up the spoils of his battle. Ichigo ate them all at once, their effect was immediate. Ichigo's eyes rolled up into their sockets as the mask on his eye started to bubble and expand. The mask piece grew upward a little past his hair line, as well as sideways covering the rest of the side of his face. It also grew downward toward where his upper jaw would be if the mask was complete. As the mask was growing his spiritual pressure skyrocketed and poured out of him with absolutely no control, Ichigo started to have spasms as he roared out in agony blindly sweeping his hands firing Cero Kakiyosemasu's in every direction. Nel quickly sonidoed around the area trying to escape the onslaught of ceros coming at her, she could feel her body involuntarily shake as she felt the ocean of reiatsu exploding out of Ichigo. His reiatsu seemed to be on par, if not over the intensity of the primera espada. After a few seconds the violent spasms subsided, giving way to Ichigo's shaking form.

Nel walked over to where Ichigo was and took a look at him, His mask now covered about a fourth of his face and made him look quite intimidating, Nel helped him up since his body was spasming like he was having a seizure. Ichigo stood up on uncertain legs, "Thanks."

"You're welcome."

Over the next few days Nel and Ichigo traveled further into the deserts of Hueco Mundo eventually coming upon a small house like structure. "Think we should stay here for a while?" Ichigo asked Nel as they came upon the structure.

"Lets scout it out first," said Nel as walked away from Ichigo and went looking around the house-like structure. Ichigo went off to do the same. They circled the structure and went inside and found nothing. Several minutes of scouting later, "Well it looks like the area's clear, so we might as well settle here for a while."

"Great, this place even has a fire place and some basic tools!"

"Excellent, then you can go get some wood for a fire."

"I didn't mean it like that you know." Ichigo said with a scowl and a great dread at the thought of having to go chop down and carry large quantities of crystalline tree parts, which oddly enough burned just like regular wood.

"I don't care, and besides you owe me."

"Ugh! Fine!" said Ichigo as he stormed out of the house and into the endless desert. Nel just chuckled to herself. Ichigo went out a few hundred yards onto the surrounding area and concentrated his reiatsu into his feet and compressed it then let it explode outward. The burst of reiatsu shook up the sand and he fell through into the menos forest. He landed gracefully on his feet and immediately the surrounding hollows dispersed and gave him his space, though the lesser hollows were mindless killing machines running solely on instinct, they respected power, and Ichigo had a lot of it. Ichigo set about his task of cutting down large portions of a crystalline tree down and loaded them up into a not so neat pile. Ichigo picked a large bundle of "logs" and jumped up through the sand and returned to the upper part of the desert. Ichigo then shouted "Shit! I forgot to bring the freaken sled!"

Ichigo then shunpoed to the house and grabbed the sled he saw earlier that would be useful for transporting the very large, and very heavy, load of crystal logs to their new settlement. He brought the sled back to the pile of logs he brought up and then loaded them onto the medium sized sled made out of some odd type of glass or crystal. Ichigo then continued on with his job of going into the forest and carrying to the surface as many logs as he could, loading them onto the sled, rinse and repeat. It took a grand total of 2 hours to do it. Every once in a while he had to go unload the sled back at the house, once he was done he had to stack them up in a neat pile right next to the house for easy access. After that Nel came out to see how he was doing. Nel whistled at the very large pile of logs, it was in a pyramid shape, about 10 feet high, and around 12 feet in diameter. "Looks like you may have gotten too much," Nel said after Ichigo looked at her.

"Hey you never told me how much to get, and besides after all of this work I'm not going to go put it back." Ichigo told her.

"Do you want a lesson?" Nel said completely dodging Ichigo's retort.

"What kind of lessons?" Ichigo asked skeptically, he didn't want a repeat of his rapid regeneration lesson.

"Sonido."

"Sonido? Why would I need to learn that, I already have shunpo?" Ichigo asked confused.

"Its because sondio and shunpo work differently to achieve the same results, but each of them have their advantages and disadvantages."

"For example, from what I understand, with shunpo you have to know exactly where you're going before you actually use the technique, but with sonido you can move however you like, even without a predetermined destination."

"That could be useful..." Ichigo mused.

"But this also comes at a cost, with sonido it takes slightly longer to actually get up to speed, and you loose speed when you change directions. With shunpo the overall speed is greater."

"So then shunpo is better!" Ichigo said feeling smart.

"Not necessarily, shunpo has the draw backs of that you can't change directions once you use the technique, you also can only travel short distances with shunpo. Sonido doesn't have these disadvantages, but it is slower and harder to control, so as you can see shunpo and sonido make up for each other's weaknesses."

"So then if I knew both I'd be able to adapt to the situation better."

"Or you could take it a step further, and actually combine shunpo and sonido," Nel could see Ichigo's eyes light up, "Also before you get your hopes up, I don't actually know if that is possible or not."

"Okay, lets get started with this, just no hacking me to pieces like before."

"Alright, but in return I want you to..." Nel started out strong, but slowly faded into a nervous and embarrassed tone.

"Yes..." Ichigo asked.

"Could you teach me shunpo?" Nel asked timidly as a blush crept up onto her face.

"Sure, besides its nothing to be ashamed of if you don't know shunpo." Ichigo said and he put his hand on Nel's shoulder. Nel who was looking down in embarrassment now looked up to the smiling face of Ichigo. "Its basically like me not knowing how to use sonido, its just that neither of us would have anyway of actually knowing the other technique." Ichigo patted her shoulder reassuringly "It's really nothing to be ashamed of."

"Your right, its like you said you'd really have no way of knowing how to use sonido just as I would have no idea of how to use shunpo." Nel said cheering up.

"It's good that your back to your old self now, so how about I teach you shunpo first?"

"Sure," Nel replied giddily.

Ichigo moved behind her and then told her to focus on her pesquisa and watch how he did it. Ichigo went as slow as he could as he shunpoed to a few feet in front of her. "All right all you have to do is pick a target and focus your reiatsu on your feet." Nel did as she was told. "Next your going to want to let the reiatsu explode outward, but only in–"

Nel went ahead and let the reiatsu explode, but didn't listen to the rest of what Ichigo had to say. The reiatsu exploded out with incredible force in every direction sending Nel shooting off in some other direction and Ichigo in another. It also kicked up a large sand plume which took its sweet time blowing away. "Nel, would you please listen to all of what I have to say? I would like to save you from the many painful, and not to mention destructive, mistakes that _I _made when I learned shunpo. Furthermore–" It was then when that he saw Nel crying like she did when she was in her child form. Ichigo rushed over to her and picked her up into his arms "Nel, don't cry, its all right nothing bad happened, you don't need to cry." Ichigo continued to console her in his arms until she finally stopped crying. 'Jeez! What is with her sudden mood swings?' Then for some reason his mind wandered back to the time when his father gave him _"The Talk." _'Damn! I didn't know arrancars did that!' After that the normal Nel reemerged and apologized to Ichigo for the sudden mood swing. Ichigo told her that it was fine and that they should probably get back to training.

"Okay, just this time listen to _all_ of what I have to say, understood?" Ichigo asked like a teacher.

"Yep!" Nel replied really bubbly.

"Okay, first pick your destination target, then focus your reiatsu on your feet. Now let it explode outward but only in a downward direction." Nel did as she was told and did a crappy shunpo that most shinigami academy students were able to perform by the time they graduate. Overall, not bad for a second attempt. Ichigo then went about telling her what she did wrong, then went over the finer points of shunpo. After about a week (though it was hard to tell with only an internal clock because of the eternal nights) Nel knew how to use shunpo with some speed and skill. Shunpo was like chess, somewhat easy to learn, very, very hard to master.

After she had learned shunpo Nel made good on her deal to teach Ichigo sonido. Thankfully by now Nel had returned and stayed her normal self, so there weren't any weird and sudden mood swings that could and did disrupt their training. Nel explained to him how to use sonido, and gave him demonstrations*. Ichigo picked up sonido pretty quickly, although like Nel with shunpo, wasn't anywhere near the best at it. Overall, their life was good for a while. The house also had a small storage of food, but nothing really potent like a vasto lorde.

They stayed in the house for a while. They continued to train and spar with each other slowly building up their skills. Nel really improved her shunpo skills as Ichigo built up his sonido skills, eventually they were able to get their respective skills to just below their original. Their spars were utterly vicious and brutal, since Ichigo would regrow pretty much anything cut off Nel would continually dissever his limbs and create huge gashes and burns. Ichigo pretty much did the same things to Nel, minus the dismembering. Their real-time combat skills were greatly improving, their rate of growth was much faster than what would be possible just fighting normal opponents.

These spars, if they could be called that, were the closest controlled fight to a life or death grudge match that was possible. Ichigo quickly surpassed the primera espada in power and speed, Nel was getting up to the second espada. After a long spar Ichigo and Nel sat together bloodied and beaten. "Your getting better," Nel gasped in between pants.

"You too," Ichigo said between pants.

Now starting to regain her breath Nel said "Your power and speed far surpass my own, but your style isn't that good, its very predictable. Thats probably the only reason I can keep up with you when you go full power."

"Hey, I like my fighting style!" Ichigo said in defense.

"That you may, but its very inefficient and animalistic. Its also not very precise."

"Yours isn't that much for than mine!"

"That may be, but your also seeing a watered down version of my normal fighting style since I'm usually running on pure instincts when I spar with you, otherwise my movement would be way to slow."

"I see. Alright then, I'll slow down for you so you can show me your real fighting style." Ichigo declared and got back up from his sitting position. Nel did the same. Ichigo told her that she had the first move.

"Fine, even though I hate going first," Nel said and quickly shunpoed to in front of Ichigo and had Gazuma poised for action which quickly turned into her hacking his sword arm off. She then sonidoed around Ichigo shooting off balas and slashing at him mid sonido.

"Damn!" shouted Ichigo trying to protect himself while carrying out a counter attack, both of these tasks made harder since Zangetsu was forcibly dropped when Nel cut off his arm. Ichigo then had an idea of what to do about Nel continually circling him with her sonido. It was risky, but he figured that the worst that could happen was him loosing everything below his chest, so he used his Cero Kakiyosemasu to fire off five ceros simultaneously outward towards where Nel was circling him. Nel immediately switched from sonido to shunpo to avoid the blasts.

Nel was about to try something else when nine vasto lordes appeared, which needless to say broke up the spar. There was one vasto lorde in the front with the rest fanning out behind him in a V type formation, the leader spoke this, "Your presence is requested by His Highness Bob."

"Who?" Ichigo asked.

"His Highness Bob is one of the seven great kings of Hueco Mundo, together with the other six kings His Highness Bob makes all of the decisions that affect and rule Hueco Mundo," replied the vasto lorde stoically.

"Uh-huh, so then why does this Bob guy want our presence?" Ichigo asked.

One of the vasto lorde who was behind the leader lunged out, only to be restrained by the leader shouting "How dare you disrespect His Highness Bob like that you piece of _TRASH!"_ The lead vasto lorde smacked him across the face and told him to stop.

"I apologize for my subordinates rash behavior, so then will you come with us, or do we have to take you forcibly?" the leader asked.

"Like you could take us," started Ichigo before he was interrupted by Nel who said "Yes, we'll come with you."

"What! Why?!?" shouted Ichigo in confusion.

"Because even if we do kill these hollow, Bob will surely send more until he get what he wants," was Nel's reply as she walked towards the band of vasto lorde. Ichigo had no choice but to follow.

"So where are we going anyway?" Ichigo asked as he walked next to Nel as they followed the vasto lorde.

"Castillo de Demonio Blanco," was the vasto lorde's reply.

* * *

*** Since I couldn't find how sonido works I'm not really able to describe how to perform it.**

**Translations: Cero Kakiyosemasu- should mean something like cero raker, though not completely accurate.**

** Castillo de Demonio Blanco- should be spanish for "White Demon's Castle**"

* * *

**A/N: Okay, there is the long awaited chapter 5. I never really got to what I need vinnrylgrave's decision on in this chapter because if I did it would probably take another week to write as well as being like 10,000 words long, so I decided to cut it off here at 5411 words, which now holds the record for the longest chapter I've ever written. Also, the way I'm doing Nel, she kind of has a split personality, like sometimes she all serious and stoic, while other times bubbly and childlike. This split personality is exaggerated by her period (yes, in this story arrancars have them). Anyway I wanted to make this chapter extra long as a reward for waiting patiently for a month or so for the chapter.**** If you or someone you know speaks Japanese and would be willing to do a translation or two could you let me know so that I can actually have translations that are better than googles ^_^. All right thats all for now, so R&R!**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: OMFG, I haven't updated this in like what, three months!? I'm so sorry about that, so I will give you this and it is quite long. Also stupid me set the last chapter as the already existing chapter five and so many of you dedicated reviewers (you know who you are and I love you for it) who reviewed my author notes chapter 5 couldn't review the actual story chapter, so if you could would you include your review on chapter 5 with this one? Pretty please? This chapter is UN-EDITED you have been warned! Well that's about it for author notes so on with the story!

* * *

**

"_I see. Alright then, I'll slow down for you so you can show me your real fighting style." Ichigo declared and got back up from his sitting position. Nel did the same. Ichigo told her that she had the first move._

"_Fine, even though I hate going first," Nel said and quickly shunpoed to in front of Ichigo and had Gamuza poised for action which quickly turned into her hacking his sword arm off. She then sonidoed around Ichigo shooting off balas and slashing at him mid sonido._

"_Damn!" shouted Ichigo trying to protect himself while carrying out a counter attack, both of these tasks made harder since Zangetsu was forcibly dropped when Nel cut off his arm. Ichigo then had an idea of what to do about Nel continually circling him with her sonido. It was risky, but he figured that the worst that could happen was him loosing everything below his chest, so he used his Cero Kakiyosemasu to fire off five ceros simultaneously outward towards where Nel was circling him. Nel immediately switched from sonido to shunpo to avoid the blasts._

_Nel was about to try something else when nine vasto lordes appeared, which needless to say broke up the spar. There was one vasto lorde in the front with the rest fanning out behind him in a V type formation, the leader spoke this, "Your presence is requested by His Highness Bob."_

"_Who?" Ichigo asked._

"_His Highness Bob is one of the seven great kings of Hueco Mundo, together with the other six kings His Highness Bob makes all of the decisions that affect and rule Hueco Mundo," replied the vasto lorde stoically._

"_Uh-huh, so then why does this Bob guy want our presence?" Ichigo asked._

_One of the vasto lorde who was behind the leader lunged out, only to be restrained by the leader shouting "How dare you disrespect His Highness Bob like that you piece of TRASH!" The lead vasto lorde smacked him across the face and told him to stop._

"_I apologize for my subordinates rash behavior, so then will you come with us, or do we have to take you forcibly?" the leader asked._

"_Like you could take us," started Ichigo before he was interrupted by Nel who said "Yes, we'll come with you."_

"_What! Why?!?" shouted Ichigo in confusion._

"_Because even if we do kill these hollow, Bob will surely send more until he get what he wants," was Nel's reply as she walked towards the band of vasto lorde. Ichigo had no choice but to follow._

"_So where are we going anyway?" Ichigo asked as he walked next to Nel as they followed the vasto lorde._

"_Castillo de Demonio Blanco," was the vasto lorde's reply.

* * *

_

"Castillo de Demonio Blanco?" Ichigo asked.

"White demon's castle," Nel commented offhandedly, "One of the Seven Great Demon Castles."

Ichigo thought about it for a minute, "Are they all named after colors?"

It was the lead hollow's turn to respond, "The other six are indeed named for their colors, but ultimately, the name is decided by the current king."

Ichigo thought about it for a while and decided to just accept it. Nel on the other hand didn't. "Wait the kings now aren't the original kings?"

"Bob is the last of the original kings, the others have been defeated and subsequently devoured. The law of Hueco Mundo is that the strong rule, and the weak are either devoured or forced into servitude," said the lead hollow solemnly.

Ichigo was infuriated by the law of Hueco Mundo, but didn't let the anger show. "So then Bob is the most powerful right?"

"Correct, Bob is the most powerful being in Hueco Mundo." One of the other hollows replied.

"So the kings could beat Aizen right?" Ichigo's naivety shown.

The hollow that tried to attack them for "insulting" Bob let out a boisterous laugh, "Ha that pathetic bastard wouldn't even be a fly to Bob!"

Now Ichigo's anger exploded, "Then why the hell don't they stop him!"

The hollow that was leading them sonidoed in front of Ichigo and clasped his throat in his hand. Although this hollow was weaker and slower than Ichigo, he was so absorbed in his anger that he wasn't alert to his surroundings and the leader was able to slip right into his guard. "You arrancar may not understand this, but us hollows do not meddle in the affairs of shinigami, especially when it would help them," his voice cold as ice, and sharp as a blade.

Just as suddenly as he attacked he let go and started to walk to the front of now still procession. Ichigo shunpoed in front of him and had Zangetsu at his throat, "Don't ever touch me again. Secondly don't ever associate me with their kind. The only arrancar that I'd ever allow you to associate me with is her," Ichigo said gesturing to Nel.

The leader seemed calm even with Zangetsu mere millimeters from his throat, though that calmness didn't spread to his subordinates who were all tensed for a battle that they knew they couldn't win. "You speak as if you're not one of them." Ichigo put his free hand to his face and pointed his fingers inward. His mask turned black with a slight blood red lining, suspiciously like his Getsuga Tensho, then wave his hand and the black stuff followed suit and then disappeared leaving his face bare. Ichigo himself didn't know what he was doing until the mask disappeared, a flicker of confusion crossed his face for a split second until it went back to his normal "angry scowl".

"I see, you are the antithesis to the arrancar, a shinigami who has attained a hollow mask and powers, I now understand your naivety to the workings of Hueco Mundo. Since we will be camping here for a while I will answer any questions you may have about Hueco Mundo."

Ichigo was shocked at the hollow's generosity. "Th-Thank you," was Ichigo's dumbfounded reply. The hollow only nodded.

* * *

**Later that night***

The hollows had a fire for Ichigo and Nel who sat close to it while the the hollows sat in their own circle talking amongst themselves. Ichigo was hugging his knees and leaning really close to the fire; his teeth chattering. "N-Nel, w-why is is so c-c-cold here?"

Nel looked to Ichigo and then looked down at the fire and continued poking at it with Gamuza's blade, "The further you move into the center of Hueco Mundo the colder it gets. I remember Szayel saying something about the energy is almost all reishi and not radiating any heat or some mumbo jumbo like that." Nel giggled when she said mumbo jumbo.

Ichigo grunted in response, he looked over to the other hollows, and despite not being even remotely close to the fire they seemed completely unaffected by the cold. "Nel why aren't they affected by the freezing cold?" Nel was just turning over a large piece of wood when Ichigo asked her and when she quickly spun to face him she flung the log onto his lap, unfortunately for Ichigo it landed ember-side down right where it hurts. Ichigo shot up screaming in pain tears pouring from his eyes, "HHHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTTTTTT! HOTHOTHOTHOTHOTHOT_HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!_" Ichigo's hakama caught fire in the crotch region, "AH!" Ichigo shouted. By now the other hollows turned to look at what all the screaming was, and when they saw Ichigo's crotch on fire they all started laughing. Ichigo continued screaming as he started to slap the fire only to start screaming in even more pain.

Nel bolted up to him, "Oh my god I'm so sorry Ichigo! Here let me help!" Nel started to slap the fire in an effort to put it out, when that inevitably failed, and made Ichigo scream like a little girl from the pain of getting hit in the balls repeatedly by Nel's superhuman strength, she ripped off his pants and shoved them into the sand. "Woo, that was could have been really bad."

Ichigo was left naked from the waist down and was crossing his legs while covering his _equipment _with his hands. "God dammit, why'd you do that?!" By now the hollows were all laughing their asses off, "Shut up!" Ichigo roared at them.

Nel looked at him and had to stifle a laugh at his bright red face and funny position. "Your pants were on fire." she stated simply.

"Really! I don't think I noticed that!" Ichigo yelled. Nel let out half a laugh, and gave him back his hakama. Ichigo used one of his hands (the other still shading his private parts) and held up his hakama, there was a large hole burned through the crotch area which would reveal quite a lot. "F*ck! How the hell am I supposed to wear _these_?"

Nel just looked at him like he was crazy, "Why? What's wrong with them?"

Ichigo just looked at her like she had just grown another head, "_What's wrong with them?_ They've got a huge freaking hole right in the crotch!"

Nel tilted her head observing the hakama, then her face lit up with sudden realization as if she had just noticed the gaping hole in them, "Then just use your bankai." Ichigo was a bit confused as to why bankai would help, but he didn't argue, Nel was usually right about these things. He tried to grab Zangetsu but it was just out of his reach, he gestured to it. Nel grabbed it, but she felt a sharp jolt when she touched the blade, her eyes widened when she heard a maniacal laughter that sounded just like Ichigo, but almost inverted.

Nothing else happened, so she handed it to Ichigo, who took it and shouted "Bankai!" A black vortex of reiryoku exploded out from where Ichigo was sitting. When it cleared it revealed Ichigo with a brand new hakama and his bankai jacket. Ichigo let out a sigh of relief that he had some clothes on again, it was then that he noticed he wasn't as cold anymore. The other hollows went back to their conversation since it seemed like there wouldn't be anymore entertainment from Ichigo. "Nel why doesn't it seem as cold?"

"Its because of your increased reiastu. And maybe your thicker clothes," Nel said going back to tending the fire. The leader of their escorts walked over to them and sat down by Ichigo.

"So what would you like to know about Hueco Mundo?" he asked while trying to get comfortable in the sand, obviously expecting a long conversation.

Ichigo thought for a moment, "Why aren't you guys affected by the cold? Oh and what's your name?"

The hollow let out a laugh, "Sevio's** my name. Here feel my arm." He held out his arm for Ichigo to touch.

Ichigo reached out a tentative hand and felt the arm, "Holy shit! Your arm is freezing!"

Sevio now let out a boisterous laugh at Ichigo's reaction, "Now you should feel your companion's arm." He did, Nel's arm was warm, just like his and every other shinigami and human. "A regular hollow has no heart, and no body heat, therefore we aren't affected by the cold because it makes no difference to us. Your companion's arm is warm like yours because of the shinigamification, even though she doesn't have a heart either."

"Uh-huh, so then what do the kings do, or like what kind of things do they decide?" Ichigo asked still immensely curious about the 7 demon kings.

"The seven kings each have their own castle, as you already know. But each castle has a settlement of hollows around it, these hollows are usually adjuchases who have had their growth stunted, or just have no interest in obtaining more power. The thing that attracts all these hollow to the castles is that the entire area around these castles are under the direct protection of the castle lord, also for hollow who haven't been stunted, the sheer amount of reishi that hangs around the castle is enough to sustain them from regressing." Sevio thought for a moment and then continued, "The things the kings decide can range from population control, to the flow of time in Hueco Mundo."

Ichigo looked astonished, "Th-They can control the flow of _time_?!"

"Of course, in the human realm, the flow of time is constant, not even the will of the soul king and the 7 demon kings together could change it there, in the soul society the flow of time is controlled by the soul king. In Hueco Mundo the flow of time is controlled by the will of the 7 demon kings, right now I believe it is sped up by a factor of 360, or was it 370? I can't remember, but this change was begun around the time Aizen left," Sevio said.

Ichigo was flabbergasted, "So then for every _year_ spent here, only a single _day_ passes in the real world and soul society!?!"

The leader smirked at Ichigo's reaction, "Correct."

Nel was shocked at this too, _"So I really haven't cost Ichigo anything really, only a few minutes, if even that! Wait that also means that we can still help in the final battle against Aizen, and if we have three and a half years to prepare Aizen won't even stand a chance!"_ she thought. Aloud she said "Ichigo, if that's true we have three and half years to get better before we have to face Aizen!"

Ichigo's face lit up at that, "Oh, my god your right! Then if you and I keep devouring vasto lordes we'll be able to easily match the espada and Aizen!"

When Ichigo mentioned that he had been devouring hollows Sevio's face hardened. "We need to get moving," all the warmth and mirth left his voice. Sevio stood up, and walked over to the other hollows. Ichigo looked to Nel who was just as confused as he was, "What was that all about?" Ichigo asked.

"I'm not sure, but if we keep moving deeper into Hueco Mundo, you'll need to maintain your bankai the entire way, and speaking of that how long _can_ you maintain your bankai?" Nel asked.

"I've never been pushed to the limit of maintaining it, but its at the very least 3 hours, but again I've never been pushed even close to the limit so its probably a much longer time than that," Ichigo stated.

"Good, because when we get really deep in Hueco Mundo the temperature is going to plummet to near unbearable levels, even with your bankai and mask, and then it will get even colder." Nel, who was very serious at the moment said. "I'm going to have to use my resurrección eventually, but the cold will get unbearable for me around the same time it gets for you, when that happens, I, and yourself, will need you to ride on my back with your bankai overcoat wrapped around my human section and yourself. It'll take a bit, but we'll also need to synchronize our reiatsu."

Ichigo started blushing with her choice of words, _"She wants me to _ride _her?"_ he thought. "Why is it that I need to ride you?"

Nel looked at him like he was stupid, but with a goodhearted "your stupid look", "Because, when I'm in my resurrección form, my whole abdomen is exposed, minus a bra. That means I'm going to need a jacket, and your bankai overcoat is probably the only coat for hundreds of miles, without it you'll freeze, and without it I'll freeze. Also having our hearts, closer will make reiatsu synchronization easier and more maintainable."

Ichigo was now thoroughly blushing after hearing that he would have to share his coat with Nel. "**Heh heh, score. I never thought I'd say this to ya kingy, but I'm proud of ya. Mmm... just think of all that bare skin be pushed up against-"** Hichigo started before Ichigo cut him off._"Shut the F*CK up you stupid horse!" _Hichigo let out bout of laughter before fading back into Ichigo's conscience. "I get the coat thing, but what exactly is reiatsu synchronization?"

Sevio came up to them, "Come on, we need to get to Castillo Demonio Blanco as soon as possible."

"OK," Nel said before standing up and following after the procession of hollows. Ichigo did the same, "Reiatsu synchronization is the synchronization of the waves of reiatsu that roll off all spiritual beings. You've already done it, every hollow has already done it, reiatsu synchronization usually occurs when a hollow or being with hollow powers devours another soul. In order to absorb the energy contained in a soul, your reiatsu needs to be at the same... wavelength, if you will. Because every soul has a unique reiatsu signature, as you already know, that is because of the way the reiatsu comes out, you can think of it like musical instruments, even if you blow the same amount of air through them they'll each sound different. Now to absorb the reiryoku contained within a soul you need to have your reiatsu match the wavelength of that reiryoku. The better you can synchronize your reiatsu with theirs the more power you get from that soul, that is what determines the evolutionary cap on a hollow. Right now, your absorption level is close to a 1 to 1 ratio, so you get almost all of the power in each soul you devour."

Ichigo was taking it in pretty well, but the thing he didn't understand is why would they synchronize their reiatsu if that's what you did when you devoured another soul? "So then why would we want to synchronize our reiatsu?"

Nel smirked, she was just getting to the good part, "You know my former fracción Pesche and Dondochakka? Well they have an attack called Cero Sincrético. They synchronize their reiatsu and form a cero from their synchronized reiatsu, so rather than taking in that synchronized reiryoku when we synchronize we'll output reiatsu. This synchronized output will be greater than both of our individual reiatsu's put together would be due to a process called "soul resonance" where your soul will amplify my power and send it back to me and vice versa."

"Oh I get it! Its like a guitar and an amp!" Ichigo said finally getting where she was going with it.

"Like a what?" Nel asked confused, since really never been in the human realm since she became a hollow.

"Oh never mind, its just something from the human realm. Its a musical instrument, and the electric guitar uses an accessory called an amplifier, or amp for short, that takes the signal sent by the guitar and amplifies it to make it louder." Ichigo said forgetting she has no experience with anything from his home realm.

"Oh, how do you know so much about the human realm anyway Ichigo?" Nel asked curiosity getting the better of her.

"Hurry up back there!" Sevio shouted at them, during their talk they had slowed down and fallen behind the other hollows.

"Alright," Ichigo shouted to Sevio. Nel and Ichigo shunpoed a few hundred feet in front of them and continued talking. "Yeah, to answer your question, I'm not even dead yet."

Nel tilted her head, "What do you mean by that?"

"Nel I'm still a living human," Ichigo said while putting his hand behind his head and giving a slight chuckle.

Nel stared at him with her mouth hanging open, "Y-your kidding right? There's no way that you could be this powerful as just a human, and your soul shouldn't even be able to take the stress of the amount of power you have, much less survive while being part hollow!"

Ichigo started laughing at her reaction, "Ha ha, I get that a lot."

Nel looked at him with real awe, and maybe was it pity? "I can only imagine the tortures your soul went through to have both a hollow and zanpakuto. And to have your soul constantly ripped from your body, I still can't comprehend what it must have been like. Besides your not natural, no offense, who did this to you?"

Ichigo was surprised by the tone of her voice, "None taken, in fact I know that what I am is incredibly unnatural. But I got my start as a substitute shinigami when my innate reiatsu attracted a hollow to my family, and Rukia came to purify it, but me being stubborn tried to attack the hollow with just my human body. Rukia took a hit that was meant for me, and was unable to fight it anymore, so in a last ditch effort to save my family gave me some of her shinigami powers. The rest is long story, but I eventually got my soul chain destroyed and lost my shinigami powers, so I underwent intensive training that nearly cost me my soul by a man named Kisuke Urahara. Kisuke's also the man who created the hogyoku. When I almost didn't get my shinigami powers I partially hollowized, and then got my powers which was where my inner hollow was born. Then I went on a bunch of adventures further developing my powers, but those are stories for another time."

Nel was shocked, "You mean you actually trained under the creator of the hogyoku?"

Ichigo nodded, "Yeah, the guys kind of creepy to be honest, and I just refer to him as Hat n' Clogs. He's also really annoying, but is also quite helpful when he wants to be."

"I'd like to meet him some day, in a way, he's kind of like my benefactor." Nel said thinking about thanking him for what he did.

"Yeah well don't tell him that aloud, it'll inflate his ego too much." Ichigo said.

Nel giggled. Their escorts finally caught up with them, "We will be sonidoing the rest of the way, please follow us." stated Sevio before disappearing in a buzz of sonido. The other escorts followed suit. "Shall we go?" Nel commented going back to her bubbly persona. Ichigo nodded and buzzed away. Nel did the same.

* * *

**Hours later**

A while ago Ichigo was forced to bring out his hollow mask to to combat the cold, just as well as Nel was forced to use her resurrección. "N-Nel I think we should do that reiatsu thing n-now." Ichigo said through chattering teeth.

"Y-Yeah I g-g-guess s-so." Nel said through her chattering teeth.

"Lets sh-shunpo really far ahead of th-them." Ichigo said rubbing his arms.

Nel didn't even say anything instead shunpoing far ahead of the escorts. Ichigo followed her. They stopped around 2 miles ahead of the others. "I-Ichigo, we n-need to flare our rei-reiatsu as much a-as we c-can while we make the shift."

Ichigo didn't reply only fared his considerable reiatsu as much as he could. Nel did the same, but not to the same affect, Ichigo had much more than she did, but he wasn't very efficient with it. Ichigo took off his overcoat letting it rest on his back, and Nel lowered her self as best she could for Ichigo to get on. Ichigo nervously got on Nel's back and tied the overcoat shut around himself and Nel's torso. The overcoat was stretched to its limits containing both occupants, and it forced Ichigo's torso up against Nel's almost flush. Once the contact was made both Nel and Ichigo let out a "Mmm..." Nel continued on saying, "Ichigo your so warm..." Ichigo wasn't really sure what to do with his arms since he couldn't put them through the arm holes and fidgeted with them trying to decide on a position for them.

With their temporary warmth they were able to curb the chattering of their teeth and talk normally. "Nel how do we synchronize our reiatsu," Ichigo finally tentatively placing them around Nel's waist, when there wasn't a protest to their position he completely wrapped them around her.

Nel let out a contented sigh, then said, "Just focus your reiatsu into your heart, and I'll synchronize mine to yours."

"Got it," Ichigo said as he focused a good deal of his reiatsu into his chest. Nel did the same and let instincts take over as if she was about to devour Ichigo, and when her reiatsu synchronized with his she stopped herself cold, lest she actually devour him. Ichigo could feel Nel's reiatsu start to flicker and then change its feel. In fact it felt almost exactly like his now, and it was only getting closer.

"Alright Ichigo, I have mine aligned with yours now just let out a small amount in my direction." Ichigo did as he was told. Nel also let out a bit of hers. This whole synchronization thing was new to her too, she only had a rudimentary understanding of reiatsu synchronization, and it was a very, very, _very_ complicated and advanced technique, so she was just kind of feeling her way around. Both of them could feel their reiatsu's bleeding into each other forming kind of a common pool that they could draw from. Nel somewhat knew how to get to this point but was completely unsure of what to do next, to get their souls to act as an amplifier for the other.

"**Ha ha, kingy this one's pretty clever, using reiatsu synchronization to keep the both of ya warm, but the way she's doing it, the common pool won't be enough."** Hichigo said to Ichigo. _"OK then Mr. Know it all pain in the ass hollow, how do we do it so there's enough?"_ Ichigo said at his hollow his voice taking on an edge. **"Tell her to open her soul, and you do the same. Next all ya gotta do is instead of using your own body as an output for your reiatsu, bypass it and use each others Each of yer souls will take it and undergo something called "sympathetic vibration" and it will cause a resonance between yer souls. But if you do it wrong or her soul rejects our energy or vice versa, well lets just say it ain't gonna be pretty. **_"Great, just what I need a huge explosion if I do something wrong." _**"Heh, heh, its going to be quite a bit worse than just a huge explosion."**

Nel was struggling with what to do next, that is until Ichigo spoke, "Nel, apparently we have to open our souls to each other and then instead of using our own souls as our reiatsu output we have to use each others soul which will cause our souls to sympathetically vibrate with that reiatsu amplifying it," Nel was shocked at Ichigo's sudden understanding of the concept, "But if we do it wrong or either of our souls reject the energy we push through each other there will be some kind of explosion thing."

"I-Ichigo, where in hell did you learn that?!" Nel asked vehemently.

"My hollow popped up again and told me about it."

"OK well we might as well give it a shot."

Ichigo nodded, he tried to open his soul, what ever the hell that meant, as best he could. Nel started to feed her reiryoku into Ichigo, at first only just a tiny amount, Ichigo could feel Nel's reiryoku pushing into him, he tried to open his soul more and finally the energy was accept and Ichigo could feel his soul start to vibrate **(not the spiritual body, just the inner soul thing)** and then the reiryoku exited him back into the common pool as reiatsu with explosive force. Both of them were shocked at how potent the new reiatsu was. "OK your turn," Ichigo said to Nel with a slight chuckle.

Nel tried her best to open her soul, she like Ichigo really had no idea what that meant, but it couldn't be too hard to figure out. When she thought she had it, "OK ready." Ichigo fed a tiny bit of his reiryoku into Nel through their soul link thing, and it got to Nel it struggled for a bit like hers did when it reached him, then it went through into her. Nel could feel a light care free overtone in Ichigo's raw reiryoku, but it also had a very dark and sinister undertone. That undertone frightened her, it sent chills down her spine, her soul closed up like a clam. Ichigo felt it close, **"Uh-oh, that is definitely _not_ good."** for the first time in, well ever, Ichigo could hear real genuine fear in his hollow's voice. _"Ah, shit."_ if his hollow was afraid, he was terrified. Nel could feel the reiryoku getting amplified over and over again, it wanted to leave, but it couldn't, it was getting so powerful it was painful. She tried to open her soul again, but that crippling fear she felt with from the sinister bite in Ichigo's reiryoku was just too much. Just as the amplified reiryoku was about to reach critical mass, she remembered what kind of a person Ichigo was and how warm the rest of his reiryoku felt, and was able to over come the fear and open her soul allowing the over-amplified reiryoku to explode outward.

Ichigo was almost flung off of Nel's back from the force of the escaping reiatsu, which created a rather large shock wave. _"Damn all of that from just that little smidgen of power I put out!"_ **"Yep that's the power of soul resonance."** After the power dissipated, Ichigo asked, "Nel, are you OK?"

"Yeah, but I could feel your hollow in your reiryoku. I really hate the term evil, but if I had to call any one thing evil, then that would be it, and it sorta of freaked me out for a minute that's all." Nel said trying to play it down.

"Oh, OK then, we can stop if you want to," Ichigo offered feeling concerned for Nel's well-being.

"No, no its fine, and besides the other hollows should be here any second now." Nel said.

"Alright, so lets get this down then." Ichigo said feeling a bit pumped about it. Nel and Ichigo started feed miniscule bits of reiryoku into each other to test how much raw reiryoku would make the required reiatsu. Once they got it down they stood there for a moment then the other hollows buzzed into existence all around them.

"Why the hell did you jump so far ahead of us?!" shouted Sevio vehemently.

"We were setting up for the long and cold trip ahead of us, and needed a bit of time to get ready," answered Nel gesturing to their new positions.

"I see, well we shall continue then," Sevio stated. The all disappeared in a buzz of sonido.

A while into their trip Ichigo started to nod off and eventually came to rest his head on Nel's shoulder between her armor plates. Nel smiled gently to herself and closed her eyes, she could feel Ichigo's steady and slow breathing, as well as his strong heart beat, his comforting embrace around her waist. To Nel they felt nice, almost like a security blanket, a beacon to focus on in this infernal, god forsaken, frigid desert. And for the first time in a long time, she felt content with how her life was.

**Many Hours Later**

Ichigo, Nel, Sevio, and the other escorts had arrived at the outer reaches of the settlement around Castillo de Demonio Blanco, they could see the actual castle looming in the distance. True to its name Castillo de Demonio Blanco was blindingly white, even in the low light of the moon. "Damn is that freaking bright," said Ichigo squinting his eyes at the castle's alabaster walls. Nel nodded her head in agreement.

"We will be walking through the town, and you two can separate because the city itself is quite a bit warmer. Arrancar, reseal your form, and Ichigo, keep part of your mask on." Sevio told them before walking up to a large circular wall that seemed to wrap around the entire city, he stepped up to a gate. A large adjuchas appeared out of seemingly nowhere. "I'm Sevio and escort team Alpha 2, as well as guests."

"I see, you may pass." the gate keeper replied, it also opened the gate for them. When Ichigo dismounted Nel and got his overcoat back on he walked through the gate with Nel after having resealed her resurrección form.

Once he got inside the gate, Ichigo was completely dumbfounded, the place looked exactly like the rukongai in Soul Society. The only real difference was that instead of regular souls all the denizens were hollows. "It seems so, peaceful," Ichigo said just looking around. He saw regular hollow, adjuchases, arrancar, and a vasto lorde or two. There were shops all around selling a variety of things, like food, pet hollows, and even shinigami dolls, although the shinigami looked more like monsters than anything else. Ichigo went up to Sevio and whispered, "Is that really how you see us?"

"Oh no, its much worse than that, they just don't want to scare the children," was Sevio's reply, he had a slight smirk on his face. "That's also why I told you to keep your mask fragments on, that way you appear as an arrancar."

Ichigo sighed, "Well its not as if I can actually keep them off for any long period of time, after a while the mask pours out of my eye, by the way it isn't all that pleasurable."

Sevio let out a boisterous laugh, catching the attention of all the denizens in the alley they were in, "I can imagine," he brought his voice down and the hollows went back to their business.

After they made their way through the surrounding city, they came to the castle gates which were surprisingly––to Ichigo and Nel anyway––open. There were two guards by the gates who nodded at Sevio. They all walked through the gate and onto the castle grounds. As soon as they got in, all the members of escort team Alpha 2 disappeared in the direction of wherever they were going with sonido. Only Sevio, Ichigo, and Nel remained. When Ichigo took the time to actually look around, he saw a beautiful courtyard, with huge and elaborate Japanese rock gardens with huge and ancient spires of rock with a glowing moss that was cool to the touch. The mosses glowed different shades of blues and greens which cast a calm shadow onto the area, with the crescent moon hanging low in the sky it created a very peaceful and harmonious atmosphere. In the small islands that dotted the sand, diaphanous and alluring crystal flowers grew, all of different shades of purples, teals, veridians, ceruleans. Each had its own level of faint opacity and some had a gentle luminescence, while others seemed to reflect and bend the light giving them a constantly shifting appearance that made the garden seem as if it went on forever. On the larger islands there were a few crystalline sakura-like trees that had pale cobalt flowers instead of the normal pale pink.

Throughout the garden there were small placid ponds with small ornamental rock borders which really helped complement the large spires of moss covered rock. In the center of it all was a colossal twisting rock obelisk that climbed high into the sky ending in a jagged apex. All around its body it had glowing runes that lazily glowed for a second then died off, some were partially or completely covered in the same moss that its smaller brethren were covered in.

"...Sugoi..." Ichigo said utterly floored. Nel could only nod in agreement.

Sevio chuckled a bit, "Ha, well this place has that affect on everyone at least once." They didn't really respond. "Well we should get going to the throne room." Again they didn't really say anything. Sevio let out another laugh, then walked up to a magnificent stained glass and wrought iron door. When he got close to it, it opened seemingly of its own accord, "Welcome to the humble domicile of King Bob."

Humble was definitely _not_ a good word to describe Castillo de Demonio Blanco. Everything about it just seemed to scream luxury and power. From the outdoor zen garden, to magnificent bleach white walls, to the huge glass and iron door, and now the throne room... or then again maybe not. Ichigo and Nel again for the second time in 5 minutes were completely astounded by what they saw. In stark contrast to the rest of the palace the throne room was considerably lackluster. The throne room wasn't even really a throne room, it was more of a giant bed with a bar and Japanese-style grill in the center of it. Ichigo sweat dropped when he saw what was presumably Bob passed out with a bottle of sake in his hand snoring and drooling. The entire room was covered from floor to ceiling in cushions, thick ones at that, and was pretty much devoid of decoration. It reminded Ichigo of a mental institution. In the center of the room was a bar with an adjacent wok style grill. Sevio coughed quite loudly, "Um, Bob isn't usually like this, at least at this time in the day. I'll wake him."

Sevio walked over to Bob's sleeping form, and tried poking him to get him to wake up, which inevitably failed. So Sevio grabbed a full bottle of sake, backed up a few paces, and then chucked the bottle at Bob's face. There was a resounding crack as the bottle's clay shattered upon hitting Bob's face, all of the sake was poured over his face. Bob bolted straight up and in his half-awake, half-drunken fit of being woken up trashed around wildly breaking some of the stuff on the bar, "Ah! Dammit what the hell was that!" Bob looked around and noticed that he had trashed his bar in his little fit, he shrugged it off, he looked around again to find Sevio standing and waiting patiently to get noticed, "Ah, Sevio you've returned, tell me did you find them?"

"Yes your highness, in fact they're here behind me now," Sevio stepped aside to allow Bob to see Ichigo and Nel. Bob hopped up and walked over to them. Before Ichigo wasn't able to get a good look at Bob, but now that he was standing up he was able to see exactly what Bob looked like. For starters, he wasn't an arrancar which quite honestly shocked Ichigo, no he was just a vasto lorde–Ichigo never thought he'd be saying that–an extremely powerful and odd vasto lorde, but still a vasto lorde. His mask resembled a lion, minus the enormous mane as well as the snout not being all that long, and he was wearing what appeared to be an exact copy of the flower kimono that Shunsui wore in the same position, except that it was a cold blue rather than a rose pink. He was of average height, around 5' 11", medium build, and had bad posture. His face was pretty much non-existent because of the mask, but strangely, his eyes were a striking dodger blue***. The rest of his skin was the normal white with some hot pink markings (Both Ichigo and Nel thought of it as a little flaming, but...) that really brought out his eyes and the kimono. His posture closely resembled Stark's.

"Ah, hello. I'm Bob, just in case you haven't noticed yet," he let out a laugh, "And you young lady, would you do me the pleasure of telling me your name?" Bob bowed and kissed Nel's hand.

Nel wasn't fazed in the least, although the same couldn't be said for Ichigo, "Neliel, Neliel Tu Oderschvank."

Bob raised himself back up to his slouched state, "A pleasure," Bob looked over to Ichigo acting like he just noticed him, "Oh, and you are?"

"_Damn womanizer!"_ Ichigo thought murderously, "Ichigo, Ichigo Kurosaki." Ichigo glared at him a bit, before his hollow interrupted his train of thought, **"I already don't like this bastard, trying to take what's ours."** Ichigo for once actually agreed with his hollow, _"Yeah I kn– WAIT what the hell do you mean _ours_?"_ Ichigo could hear Hichigo laughing, **"Our little arrancar."** Ichigo took great offense to that, _"She's not _ours. _She's not just some play object up for grabs!"_ His hollow only laughed again before his presence faded back into Ichigo's mind.

Bob shook his hand, both of them trying to squeeze the life out of the other person's hand. They went on shaking and crushing each others hand until simultaneously both of their hands cracked really loudly. Both of them had just broken their hands, but neither even winced, and never once breaking eye contact. Ichigo's hand started to bubble as the bones repaired themselves, a second later Bob's hand did the same. "Strong handshake, I like that in a guy."

Bob said.

Ichigo smirked he knew he had a chance right here to take a stab at Bob. Ichigo feigned horror, "Whoa! Are you coming onto me?" Bob's face, or mask (whatever), went from one of cool, and lazy composure to one of shock and horror in one second flat. "Dude if your like that, that's cool and all, but I do _not _swing that way." Ichigo put up his hands and backed away a little. Ichigo could hear the sound of his hollow cracking up.

Bob's face then went from shock to furious, there was no way to come back from that. "Why don't we have a seat and discuss some important matters. Namely, what the hell are you two arrancar doing devouring vasto lordes and scouting parties."

Ichigo's eyes tightened, "I'm not an arrancar."

Bob, looked his way again with actual interest in his dodger blue eyes, "Really, then tell me, what exactly are you? You have the body of a shinigami, the eyes of a vizard, and the mask of an arrancar."

"I'm a human turned shinigami, turned vizard, turned whatever the hell I am now." Ichigo said.

Bob was again in shock, this time not from being called gay, "A human you say? Well this certainly is interesting, how is it that your human soul can take the stress of all the power you hold within?"

Ichigo scoffed, "Dunno, don't really care either."

Bob nodded, "Now that's the attitude! You don't overanalyze things and just go with the flow, I'm really starting to like you Kurosaki!" He immediately regretted his choice of words.

Ichigo smirked then shook his head, "Bob what have I told you about coming onto me. I just don't swing that way dude."

"Urasai!" Bob shouted with killing intent as well as a good deal of reiatsu.

"Whatever dude," Ichigo said seemingly unfazed by the vast amount of reiatsu bearing down on him.

"Moving on. Lets have a seat, I can sense that this'll take a while." Bob said while sitting down by his bar, Ichigo and Nel did the same. "Can I get you anything to drink?"

"Umm," Nel said while putting her finger by her mouth in her bubbly persona's thinking gesture, "Nope!" she chirped.

"I'll just have some water," Ichigo said not really wanting to try one the concoctions Bob was currently making.

"Bor-ing!" Bob said then poured two sakazuki cups of the concoction he had made and handed one to Ichigo.

Ichigo looked at it distastefully. Bob just downed his and let out a contented sigh, Ichigo warily sniffed his, he reared back grabbing his nose, "Ah! That's disgusting! It freakin burns!" Bob looked at him like he was crazy. "God just what the hell proof is this thing?!?"

Bob still was looking at him like he was crazy, "Its only 190 proof, its one of my weakest drinks."

Ichigo nearly choked, "_Only_!?! That's 95% alcohol! And you call that your weakest drink?!" Nel was laughing at the whole thing.

"Yare yare, your not good with the alchy are ya?" Bob asked with a self-satisfied smirk on his face.

"You know what? Just shut up and lets get down to business, why the hell did you want to meet us?" Ichigo nearly yelled as he slammed his fist on the bar causing it to crack under the force.

"Fine, fine, we'll skip the pleasantries, I wanted to talk to ya because you've been thinning out the herd of vasto lorde." Bob said getting really serious.

Ichigo could sense the seriousness, this wasn't just fun and games anymore. "Yeah, what about it? Is it a good or bad thing?"

Bob let up on the seriousness and went back to his care-free lazy attitude, "Ha ha, its a good thing ma boy." _"Did he seriously just call me his boy?" _Ichigo thought feeling disgusted and just a little freaked out. "You've saved my men a lot of time, generally vasto lordes are pretty hard to kill."

"Wait why do you want to thin out the vasto lordes?" Nel asked, she was quite confused.

"Because too many free running and arrogant vasto lordes will cause a lot of problems for Hueco Mundo, vasto lordes tend to like having their own kingdom of sorts. They also don't like other vasto lorde, so they take minions and send them to fight each other. This leads to many, many wars between the bigger players, so we kings will thin out the herd every once in a while. During this time we also will obtain a few servants who have learned their place." Bob answered.

Ichigo nodded, if you weren't strong you died or you swallowed your prided and bowed down to someone more powerful than you. "So then doesn't that make us a threat?"

"Perhaps," Bob said stroking his chin/snout. "But that's only if you can obtain more power, as it stands now, you are just below the level of being able to topple one of the kings and taking his place. And on top of all that, you don't seem like the type of person who's power hungry and only craves battle, no, you need a reason to fight. You also aren't the type of person who wants their own kingdom to flaunt their power. No, you aren't an attacker or a ruler, you're a protector. You only go into battle to protect people close to your heart," Bob was really serious now, "you do still have one correct?" he finished playfully.

"I do. And you are correct about the rest of it, but if anyone comes in the way of protecting those dear to me, even you or the other kings, I wouldn't hesitate to cut you down and take you place if need be." Ichigo was just as serious as Bob was, he also had his "threatening scowl" on.

"Ha I suppose," Bob started jovial, but his voice soon dropped into a threatening tone, "but you should be careful where you point your sword, you just might get more than you can handle."

"I've always gotten more than I can handle, but each time I thought of loosing them, and it gave me the strength to pull through," Ichigo glared at Bob. Nel just sat there smiling and looking back and forth between them.

Bob was staring intently at Ichigo, then all of a sudden his demeanor snapped from threatening to something akin to Urahara's laughing smile thing. "Very well then Kurosaki, just remember, your not invincible."

Ichigo was a just a little creeped out by the similarity of his demeanor to Urahara's. "Yeah, well I think you should take your own advice every once in a while."

"Ha, well I guess your right, I tend to think of myself as unbeatable every once in a while." Bob said laughing. "But, the other matter I wish to discuss is yourself Kurosaki." Again his attitude shifted like the wind. Ichigo waited for him to continue. "You say you were a human, ah excuse me, _are_ a human, then you obtained shinigami powers right?" A nod was his response. "Well then what happened next on your roller coaster of a life?"

"_How the hell does he know anything about roller coasters?!?"_ Ichigo thought, but decided it wasn't important, "Another shinigami, sliced my soul chain so that I would loose my powers and go back to a normal human. He also took one of my friends, so I went through some training to get my powers back and at that time I gained an inner hollow. I invaded Soul Society to get her back and in that time I was able to achieve bankai. I then eventually learned how to control my inner hollow becoming a vizard, then lastly I came here to rescue another kidnapped friend and started devouring hollows and became what I am now. By the way what _am_ I now?"

"Ha well who knows, but to me you seem to be a near perfect mix between a hollow and a shinigami. Arrancars and vizards are abominations, arrancar, hollows who forcibly remove their mask and gain human form. Vizard, shinigami who forcibly tear a void into their soul to don a mask. No offense to the lady here. But still you were never a vizard because you devoured hollows, no matter what they say vizards are still predominately shinigami and cannot devour other souls. So you are truly something unique." Bob said.

Nel was just a little peeved that he had just called her an abomination, but kept her tongue silent. Ichigo however didn't, "That doesn't really answer my question, and its also not helping that you just called some of my friends abominations."

"I said no offense, but still, like I said you are something entirely unique. You are your own species, so you may call yourself whatever you wish. But while we're at it, do you wish to discuss your abilities?" Bob said.

"What kind of abilities? Do you mean my zanpakuto's powers?" Ichigo asked a little wary.

"Oh no, no, I just mean your basic abilities, like kido, shunpo, devouring souls, you know that type of thing." Bob asked and Ichigo could swear he saw Urahara sitting across from him for a second.

"Ok, obviously I have a zanpakuto, it also has a sentient avatar. I also have an inner hollow that has apparently taken the place of my zanpakuto avatar. I'm a master shunpo user and am also decent with sonido. I _can _use kido, but suck at it, its just really not my thing, as well as using ceros. I can also devour souls. That about all you'd like to know?" Ichigo finished.

"Hmm like I said you seem to be a perfect mix of shinigami and hollow, although right now you aren't balanced. Your aura is still more shinigami than hollow, right now its around 60:40, most arrancar and vizard are 85:15." Bob said. "Oddly your companion is around 70:30, but she is just an anomaly."

"Hmm I guess my hollow still hasn't given up the fight or his powers," Ichigo said thoughtfully.

Bob looked at him curiously, "Well if I really dig around in your reiatsu I just barely detect the seam between your powers. I'm guessing your going to have to beat him down into complete submission." Bob yawned.

"I see, is there anyway to induce it so that I can get it outa the way?" Ichigo asked hopefully, the way Bob was talking, he sounded like he actually knew what he was talking about.

"I dunno, I barely know anything about it," Bob shrugged his shoulders. Ichigo comically dropped to the ground.

"What the hell do you mean, you acted like you knew everything about it!" Ichigo shook his fist at him.

"Meh, you know, I'm getting tired, its late, and this conversation is getting pretty heavy so why don't we all just got to bed." Bob said before yawning. "Sevio!" A half a second after Bob yelled out his name Sevio appeared.

"Yes your highness?" Sevio bowed.

"Would you please escort our guests to a room?" Bob asked before clonking out on his back.

"*Sigh* Follow me, I'll take you to your room." Sevio said opening a door on the outskirts of the throne room.

Nel and Ichigo followed Sevio through dozens of twisting white corridors. Finally they arrived at a door that looked exactly like all the other billion doors in the palace. "Here is your room, in the morning I'll bring you down to where ever Bob is eating as he still wishes to talk with you."

Ichigo and Nel both nodded then Sevio disappeared in a buzz of sonido. They looked towards each other and shrugged before Nel opened the door to their room. The room was bright green inside, and had various pieces of artwork around the room for decoration. Much to Ichigo's dismay there was only one bed, and it was only big enough for two people snuggling. Nel didn't seem all that concerned with the sleeping arrangements. Nel continued to look around the medium sized room before plopping herself on the bed and crawling head first into the comforter much like a little kid would. Her head popped back out at the bottom of the bed, "Come on in Ichigo its really warm under the blanket!"

Ichigo was blushing furiously about Nel wanting to sleep in the same bed with him, he shut the door. "Nah, I'm good Nel, you can have the bed, I'll just sleep on the floor." And who said chivalry was dead?

"Ichigo, how's your bankai?" Nel asked returning to her stoic persona for the first time in a while.

"I'm still feeling pretty good with it," Ichigo said, even though he knew he wouldn't be able to keep it out for more than a few more hours; he could feel the fatigue setting in.

"Ok good, because if you can't hold it out during the night you'll freeze to death." Nel said, "I'd still rather you sleep in the bed with me so that you don't freeze..."

"I'll be fine don't worry about it," Ichigo said before picking a spot on the floor on the side of the bed.

"Ugh fine..." Nel said as she got comfortable then she noticed that there was only one blanket in the entire room. "Um Ichigo, you do realize that there's only one blanket in here, right?"

"Crap," Ichigo said, "oh well."

"Ichigo are you sure you don't wan to just share the bed, I really don't mind?" Nel asked one last time.

"Yes Nel I'm sure," Ichigo said before laying down.

"Here at least take a pillow, there's two of them here," Nel said as she grabbed one of the spare pillows and handed it to Ichigo who gratefully took it and slipped it under his head.

"Night Nel," Ichigo said tiredly.

"Night Ichigo." Nel said before yawning loudly.

About 3 hours into the night Ichigo's bankai gave out and was transformed back into Zangetsu. Much to Ichigo's discomfort it was FREEZING here! And the worst part was that he was too fatigued from using his bankai for around 2 days straight to actually put up a good defense against the biting cold. Around 10 minutes Ichigo's teeth were chattering uncontrollably. Another 5 minutes the skin on his fingers and toes was starting to turn blue. By now his breathing was ragged and teeth were chattering quite loudly. They were loud enough to wake Nel from her slumber. "I-Ichigo, what on earth are you doing?" Nel said in between yawns. When Ichigo didn't reply and Nel had woken up enough to see him, she freaked out. "Oh my god Ichigo! Why the hell didn't you tell me your bankai gave out?!?"

Ichigo tried to say something, but it was stuck behind his chattering teeth and ragged breathing. Nel then noticed his fingers, they were all blue, and his skin was really pale. "Ichigo take off your clothes!"

Now just from the absurdity of that sentence was Ichigo able to get out a sentence, "N-Nel what th-the h-h-hell?!?"

Nel started to strip down starting with her top, "Ichigo your going into hypothermia, you need to get warm, and fast." Nel had gotten her top off and her large _assets_ were hanging freely. Ichigo blushed the hardest he had ever in his entire life, even more than when Yoruichi was naked before him, and that was saying something. Nel then started to remove her pants, Nel looked up at him mid-strip, "Ichigo hurry up and take your clothes off!" before continuing to remover her pants. Ichigo still just stood still, staring at Nel. After she got her pants off it became clear to Ichigo that she was a natural green-hair**** because _the carpet matched the drapes_ if you know what I mean. "Dammit Ichigo!" Nel said before she nearly jumped on him and ripped off his shihkusho effectively making him just as naked as her. Ichigo was so surprised that he couldn't move. Nel dragged him with her into the bed. **"Hey king, I'm gonna let you in on a secret. Hollows are **_**great**_** in bed. *cackling*."** Next she covered them with the blanket while pressing her body firmly against his.

Ichigo tried and failed to squirm out of her grip, but he was slowly loosing the will to, she was sooooo warm. Both of them were silent until Nel's breathing settled into a slow and steady pace. Ichigo did get warm quite quickly like this, and he too eventually fell asleep. That is until Nel woke him up in her sleep.

Ichigo could feel Nel's leg over his and also the distinct sensation of something hot and wet pressing up against his thigh. Ichigo's blush reinstated itself over his face. Nel then started to rub her hip against Ichigo and she moaned out in her sleep, "Mmm, Ichigo... ah, more... please more..." Ichigo got a nose bleed but just laid there stock still with his eyes wide open. Nel's hand migrated from his chest downward stopping just before she touched anything important. She continued to rub her hips against him and Ichigo still just laid there. He didn't get a wink of sleep that night.

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**A/N:* Yes there is a difference between night and day in Hueco Mundo.**

**** Its pronounced Say-vee-oh (sorry if that's anyone or anything's actual name I just made it up)**

***** Go to wikipedia and search for blue, then go to the bottom to shades of blue you'll find it there.**

****** Best thing I could come up with since I have no idea what you'd call someone with green hair (along the lines of brown hair Brunette; Gold hair Blonde)**

**Its finally done! Obviously this is the longest chapter I've ever written for anything and will probably stay that way for a good while. Its 10338 words with author notes and recap and 9495 words with out. Everyone please cheer for my first 10K+ word chapter, I view this as a major milestone in my writing career (not that I get paid for any of my writing). And I know it got a little raunchy at the end, but I figured it made for good IchiNel fluff. Also my pen name being bob115 and the king's name Bob was purely a coincidence and in no way is the description of King Bob even close to what I look like (except for the height and the lion's face =P ). Just as an FYI Ichigo and Nel, did **_NOT_** have sex, Ichigo just couldn't get to sleep because of what Nel was doing, not because they were having sex. And please put a review of chapter 5 with this one if you reviewed the author notes version of chapter 5 and weren't able to review the actual chapter 5. Oh and I appologize if I've taken too many liberties with things in the bleach universe. Also please don't expect other chapters to be this long because they most likely won't. Please R&R, I need my review fix!**


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: Ok I know it's been a while, but I'm back. I do hope to get onto a regular(ish) update schedule, but I'm not making any promises. Also if I take more than about 2-3 weeks to update, then just send me some pm's it'll usually get me going (on that note, this chapter has been kick started by bydo, so you can all thank him/her for this update, otherwise this would probably still be in the making, and by making I mean me procrastinating. Also I live in then 'Central Time' time zone so please use that for reference before calling me out on my promises. Well I would also like to mention that much of the stuff I made up during last chapter will almost certainly never make another appearance, except maybe in passing. That is unless there is overwhelming, and I mean **_**really, really overwhelming**_** demand for it. My reason is because I almost always hate when authors take stuff like that into their own hands and make up stupid stuff like what I did last chapter, and honestly I'm ashamed. Well I believe that's it for now so... yeah.

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**

_**Recap:**_

_Ichigo was blushing furiously about Nel wanting to sleep in the same bed with him, he shut the door. "Nah, I'm good Nel, you can have the bed, I'll just sleep on the floor." And who said chivalry was dead?_

"_Ichigo, how's your bankai?" Nel asked returning to her stoic persona for the first time in a while._

"_I'm still feeling pretty good with it," Ichigo said, even though he knew he wouldn't be able to keep it out for more than a few more hours; he could feel the fatigue setting in._

"_Ok good, because if you can't hold it out during the night you'll freeze to death." Nel said, "I'd still rather you sleep in the bed with me so that you don't freeze..."_

"_I'll be fine don't worry about it," Ichigo said before picking a spot on the floor on the side of the bed._

"_Ugh fine..." Nel said as she got comfortable then she noticed that there was only one blanket in the entire room. "Um Ichigo, you do realize that there's only one blanket in here, right?"_

"_Crap," Ichigo said, "oh well."_

"_Ichigo are you sure you don't want to just share the bed, I really don't mind?" Nel asked one last time._

"_Yes Nel I'm sure," Ichigo said before laying down._

"_Here at least take a pillow, there's two of them here," Nel said as she grabbed one of the spare pillows and handed it to Ichigo who gratefully took it and slipped it under his head._

"_Night Nel," Ichigo said tiredly._

"_Night Ichigo." Nel said before yawning loudly._

_About 3 hours into the night Ichigo's bankai gave out and was transformed back into Zangetsu. Much to Ichigo's discomfort it was FREEZING here! And the worst part was that he was too fatigued from using his bankai for around 2 days straight to actually put up a good defense against the biting cold. Around 10 minutes Ichigo's teeth were chattering uncontrollably. Another 5 minutes the skin on his fingers and toes was starting to turn blue. By now his breathing was ragged and teeth were chattering quite loudly. They were loud enough to wake Nel from her slumber. "I-Ichigo, what on earth are you doing?" Nel said in between yawns. When Ichigo didn't reply and Nel had woken up enough to see him, she freaked out. "Oh my god Ichigo! Why the hell didn't you tell me your bankai gave out?!?"_

_Ichigo tried to say something, but it was stuck behind his chattering teeth and ragged breathing. Nel then noticed his fingers, they were all blue, and his skin was really pale. "Ichigo take off your clothes!"_

_Now just from the absurdity of that sentence was Ichigo able to get out a sentence, "N-Nel what th-the h-h-hell?!?"_

_Nel started to strip down starting with her top, "Ichigo your going into hypothermia, you need to get warm, and fast." Nel had gotten her top off and her large __assets__ were hanging freely. Ichigo blushed the hardest he had ever in his entire life, even more than when Yoruichi was naked before him, and that was saying something. Nel then started to remove her pants, Nel looked up at him mid-strip, "Ichigo hurry up and take your clothes off!" before continuing to remove her pants. Ichigo still just stood still, staring at Nel. After she got her pants off it became clear to Ichigo that she was a natural green-hair**** because __the carpet matched the drapes__ if you know what I mean. "Dammit Ichigo!" Nel said before she nearly jumped on him and ripped off his shihkusho effectively making him just as naked as her. Ichigo was so surprised that he couldn't move. Nel dragged him with her into the bed. __**"Hey king, I'm gonna let you in on a secret. Hollows are **__**great**__** in bed. *cackling*."**__ Next she covered them with the blanket while pressing her body firmly against his._

_Ichigo tried and failed to squirm out of her grip, but he was slowly loosing the will to, she was sooooo warm. Both of them were silent until Nel's breathing settled into a slow and steady pace. Ichigo did get warm quite quickly like this, and he too eventually fell asleep. That is until Nel woke him up in her sleep._

_Ichigo could feel Nel's leg over his and also the distinct sensation of something hot and wet pressing up against his thigh. Ichigo's blush reinstated itself over his face. Nel then started to rub her hip against Ichigo and she moaned out in her sleep, "Mmm, Ichigo... ah, more... please more..." Ichigo got a nose bleed but just laid there stock still with his eyes wide open. Nel's hand migrated from his chest downward stopping just before she touched anything important. She continued to rub her hips against him and Ichigo still just laid there. He didn't get a wink of sleep that night._

**The Next Morning**

Ichigo was just laying there stock still, eyes wide open and blood shot, crusted blood all over his face descending from his nose. Nel let out a cute yawn as she awoke and stretched fully showing off her _assets_ to anyone who happened to be looking at the time. Which thankfully for Nel's modesty was no one. "Morning Ichi. Get a good night of sleep?"

Ichigo didn't even budge other than nodding stiffly. "Well that's good, I'm gonna go see if they have a shower or something around here." Nel then put on her clothes, directly in front of Ichigo of course. Ichigo's nose restarted its competition with Niagara Falls as Nel bent over with her back aimed precisely at Ichigo's face. After Nel got dressed all the way she went off to find someone to inquire about the bathing facilities, Ichigo sighed and then closed his eyes. He was asleep instantly. About 2.87 seconds later Sevio burst into the room shouting, "GOOOOOOOOOD MOOOOORNINGG, !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" And just to top it all off, he was launching a flying kick at Ichigo. Perfect.

Ichigo didn't even wake up as he lifted his fist into the air where Sevio proceeded to face plant into. "Shut. The. Fruck. Up. Now. Old Man." He somehow managed to threaten in his sleep. Old habits die hard. Sevio was comically crying and clutching his non-existent nose.

"Hmph! Well fine, don't accept my generous wakeup call!" crossing his arms as he said this, Sevio stomped out of the room and slammed the door behind him. Ichigo then settled into a deeper slumber. That is until about 30 minutes Nel arrived dripping wet and clad in barely more than a towel that was obviously _way_ too small to serve as anyone's bath towel. "Ichigo! It's time to wake up!" Nel squealed in a very child like manner before glomping him. Which caused Ichigo to shoot up in reflex dislodging the sheet that was covering him, and allowing Nel's towel to go flying off in some random direction.

Obviously this did not bode well for Ichigo as time seemed to freeze up and the world go black in white with Nel's chest right about to hit him in the face. He then heard maniacal laughter coming from his bleached counterpart who was enjoying the _view_ behind Nel's flayed legs. **"Hmm, very nice. Hey king when 'er ya gonna move in for the kill?" **Hichigo said with a shit eating grin.

"Kill? The hell have you been smoking?" Ichigo said genuinely confused.

**"Oh come on, even **_**you**_** aren't **_**that**_** oblivious!" **Hichigo was looking expectantly at Ichigo's confused face, his grin fell. **"Holy shit you are! Hahaha you really don't know the fuck I'm talking about do you?"**

Ichigo shook his head, "Nope not a clue." Ah, the innocence of the young.

**"Ugh, I mean when 'er ya gonna bang Nel over there?" **Hichigo said jerking a thumb at Nel.

"WHAT! Why the hell would I do that?! She probably doesn't even like me!" Ichigo shouted with a raging blush on his face.

**"Are ya freak 'in kidding me? just look at her face, add that to the fact that she constantly strips in front of you, and you got one love-sick puppy. Or antelope, as the, case may be."** Hichigo said.

"Just get on with whatever you wanted to say you bleached freak! I don't want to talk about this anymore!" Ichigo said, blush even more intense than it just was.

"Yare, yare, calm down king. I'm just here to mess with your head, and to tell you that you're gonna get devoured by me within the week." Hichigo said with a very sadistic smile before letting out a long string of cackles as the world slowly sped up and regained its color.

Nel landed in just such a way that her breasts first hit Ichigo in the face, then she slid down so that her mouth was just centimeters away from Ichigo's own. And that wasn't even the worst part of it. Nel was basically straddling Ichigo both completely naked, which led to Ichigo's body reacting in a very compromising way. Nel let out a small breath, tickling Ichigo's lips, then said "Ichigo, what's poking me in the butt?"

One very awkward conversation involving kiwis and curling (the sport) later, both Ichigo and Nel were dressed and ready for the day. Ichigo involuntarily let out a shudder, he would never be able to look at kiwis the same way again. "So what are we going to do?" Ichigo asked as he looked up at the ceiling of Castillo de Demonio Blanco.

Nel shrugged. Nel was looking around at the courtyard that they were walking through, it was very beautiful, though not as beautiful as the first one they saw with all the crystalline flowers and reflecting ponds and stone monoliths. "Hey why don't we go into town?" Ichigo asked.

"Sure!" Nel yipped. "Wait what about your mask?"

"Hmm, yeah I guess I haven't' thought about it, but it's been off for way longer than it ever has before…" Ichigo pondered.

"I may be of some assistance with that matter." Sevio said as he walked up behind them.

"Go on," Ichigo said.

"Your masked fragment seems to be dependent on the amount of reiatsu you have extra, when you called out your mask before it started acting on its own you had to focus a large amount of reaitsu around your face right?" Ichigo nodded, "Well when you ate a higher level hollow your reiatsu jumped up which in turn made your masked form then grow on its own. Over the night you exhausted your surplus of reiatsu, therefore you masked flaked away." Sevio explained.

"Hmm, I see, so I have to wait for my reiatsu to- ARGH!" Ichigo yelled as white fluid started to pour out of his eye and arc around and back to his face forming a mask piece bit by bit.

Sevio winced at the display, "Damn, that cannot fell comfortable." Ichigo by now was clutching his face and spasmming on his feet arms slashing at air and occasionally loosing a cero. After about 30 seconds the whole thing was over. Ichigo was bent over gasping for breath.

"That fucking hurt like hell." Ichigo managed to pant out between pants. Sevio nodded sagely.

"Ichigo are you alright?" Nel asked running over to him and letting him use her as a support.

"Yeah, though that was the worst one yet," Ichigo said slowly catching his breath. "Sevio, is the pain going to get progressively worse the more times it comes back forcefully?"

"It shouldn't, though I think it will get worse the more your body is exhausted." Sevio hypothesized.

"Hn," Ichigo replied.

One tour of the town later. Ichigo and Nel were walking back to their room when Sevio sonidoed right in front of them, "Bob wishes to see you." He then proceeded to sonido away leaving Ichigo and Nel to find their way to bob's chambers. When they finally did arrive, Bob was drunk and smacking empty bottles against his mask. "The hell are you doing?"

"I think I brained my damage." Bob slurred.

"YOUR DRUNK AREN'T YOU!?" Nel shouted with such a terrifying voice that only a seriously pissed off woman could produce, more terrifying than the screams of the most tortured soul in the deepest pits of hell.

**Deepest Pits of Hell**

A tortured soul sneezed. The demon tormenting it looked at it "I is confuzzled, why you sneeze?" the demon said/hissed at the soul. It just shrugged. The torture resumed as if uninterrupted.

**Castillo de Demonio Blanco**

"Nel, I swear to -hic- drunk I'm not god!" Bob again slurred.

Nel was about to smack him when Bob got the brilliant idea of trying to kiss her. Yeah, not good for Bob. Bob's lip/mask was about to reach Nel's when she suddenly reared back abandoning her attempts at hitting Bob. Bob followed, catching Nel by the wrist before Ichigo could intervene, Bob had her held up against him with his tongue, which was freakishly long, running up and down Nel's face and neck. His other hand that wasn't holding Nel was messing with her top trying to get the blasted thing off (Ichigo after having watched her strip and dress in front of him multiple times, _still _couldn't figure out how the hell that thing went on and off). "NOOOOO! Get your hands OFF OF MEEE!!"

It was at this point that Ichigo sprang into action. Ichigo quickly drew Zangetsu, wordlessly going into bankai and his mask formed the rest of the way of its own accord, though not as it did when he tried to suppress it. Ichigo sonidoed up to bob cleaving his arm off and quickly grabbing Nel and whipping her away from the battle that was sure to ensue.

To his credit Bob barely even winced when he had his arm cleaved off by Tensa Zangetsu, though it started to re-grow a few seconds later. "You'll pay for that." Bob hissed at Ichigo.

"I could say the same to you, teme."

"As much as I want to smack your insolent ass up and down the wall, we'll have to relocate so as to not destroy the castle." Bob growled now showing his lion-like traits. Bob sonidoed off to someplace. Ichigo followed, Nel followed Ichigo.

They arrived in a large arena-esque area. Bob stood near the middle Ichigo appeared about 20 feet in front of him, with Nel stopping near the stands to stay out of the way of what is about to happen. "Ichigo, please don't die…" Nel whispered to herself.

"Ready whelp?" Bob growled/hissed now.

"Whenever you are ya old-fart." Ichigo retorted.

And with that they both buzzed out of the eyes of Nel as they started their fight.

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**A/N: OK OK I'm really sorry for the shortness of this chapter, but I will add some fluff to it before posting the next chapter, namely their tour of the town since I was having some major writer's block on that, as well as fix chapter 2 which is absolutely pitiful. Also I felt like this was a good part to stop the chapter on, since it's really a big cliffy, and we see the true colors of Bob, which I might add is in no way based off of myself or what I would want to look and act like if I was to place myself in the bleach universe, it was just the first name that popped into my head, so yeah. please review and remember that I will probably delete this one and repost it when I add the whole town bit which probably be around 2-3k words long. Please review and not hate me for the shortness and lateness of this chapter *prays to whatever is listening*. R&R. **


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